


Behind Enemy Lines

by bitch_I_might_be



Series: Thin Ice 'Verse [7]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alex does not have a good time in this, Alexander Hamilton is George Washington's Biological Son, Alexander Hamilton is a Little Shit, Angst, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, George Washington is a Dad, He's like YES I love this man but At What Cost, Hurt Alexander Hamilton, Hurt/Comfort, I mean neither have John and Washington but for different reasons, Implied Sexual Content, John and Washington are aggressively supportive, John is exhausted, Love makes John stupid apparently, M/M, Mayhaps ;), Non-Consensual Touching, Panic Attacks, Prisoner of War, Reckless John Laurens, Torture, Washington will literally never let his son do anything ever again after this, Whipping, Whump, a horrible human, he has no self-preservation, is the author projecting?, the oc in here is a dirty trash man and I hate him, threats of mutilation, we do not stan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:54:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 43,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27701669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitch_I_might_be/pseuds/bitch_I_might_be
Summary: It was supposed to be a normal day.Then, the ambush.And just like that, Alexander was gone, taken by a man who seemed to have a personal problem with General Washington - and John and the general were left to find a way to get him back home, ideally safe and in one piece.
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton & George Washington, Alexander Hamilton & Original Male Character(s), Alexander Hamilton/John Laurens, John Laurens & George Washington
Series: Thin Ice 'Verse [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2004361
Comments: 201
Kudos: 229





	1. Day One (Part One)

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first multi-chapter fic! Well, since I was twelve, anyway, lol.  
> I got about half written, I think, can't say how long it'll end up being, though. I decided to chapter this mostly because there'll be so many POV shifts and it would get confusing.
> 
> This also features a lot of Alex. I write his POV one (1) time and instantly fall in love with that bitch like my name is John Laurens, so... get ready for a lot of Alex in this :)  
> Will anyone in this AU ever catch a break? No<3

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

It was supposed to be a simple, short trip around the forest they were stationed close to, because the general wanted to have a look at the terrain. The scouts they’d sent out had come back and didn’t report anything suspicious, no sign of the enemy; the redcoats shouldn’t be there.

And yet, the cold metal of a gun was pressed to John’s head.

Alex, Lafayette and Tilghman weren’t much better off, and while Washington himself was free of any british henchmen, he had dropped his own gun as soon as the enemies’ commander told him to; the british obviously knew they wouldn’t get far with threatening the man himself, but his aides, well. That was a different thing altogether, and the fact that his son was at risk, even though they didn’t know that–they could have asked anything of him at that instance.

“It’s so good to see you, George,” the commander said, a tall man with dirty blond hair, piercing blue eyes and a sharp, sleazy smile John would have loved to punch off his face.

The general narrowed his eyes. “I cannot say I share the sentiment, Smith.”

John’s eyebrows shot up his forehead, and he tried to make eye-contact with Alex, on the other side of the clearing; his expression was neutral, not giving anything away, but John could read the uneasiness in his eyes when he returned his gaze.

The commander, Smith, crossed his arms over his chest and tutted. “Is that how you greet all your old friends? How rude,” the man said. The urge to punch that face in grew stronger in John with every word out of his mouth.

“I suppose greeting ‘old friends’ by taking their staff hostage isn’t considered rude in Britain, then,” Washington said, shoulders tensing further. John had known the general for long enough to recognise that as a sign of frustration–he couldn’t think of a way out. They were surrounded, and the only possible outcome for them was death at british hands.

John knew this just as well as him, but he wouldn’t panic. He was a soldier. They couldn’t afford panic, every single one of them needed to stay as calm and collected as they possibly could.

Smith barked out a laugh; it sounded like it hurt him. “All is fair in love and war, wouldn’t you agree? Besides, you _have_ made quite a name for yourself. Head of the continental army, huh? Not too bad for a tobacco-planter. A pity I have to put an end to you now.”

John’s eyes widened as the man drew his own gun and he stared at Alex, fighting off the instinct that told him to kick out at the soldier at his side and wrestle the gun from him. That might have worked if he was on his own, but like this, he would only give the others a reason to shoot.

Alex stared back at him, a glint of panic in his eyes, and then- another spark. An idea. He straightened himself up, and the soldier to his side pressed the gun harder to the back of his head, grabbed his arm tighter. John shook his head at him, the slightest movement he could make, but he knew Alex would pick up on it–that he would notice unfortunately didn’t mean he would heed it.

“If you kill him now, you won’t gain anything. Do you know how many people there are, just waiting to take his place? You cut off one head and two grow back in its stead,” Alex said, and John closed his eyes in resignation. There was no going back now that Alex had spoken.

“Hamilton,” the general said, voice low, a warning. He knew just as John did that whatever was to follow couldn’t be good.

“Oh?” Smith said with raised eyebrows, twirling the gun in his hand. “Do pray tell, what would you do in my stead, young Hamilton?”

Alex let out a deep breath, but before he could answer, the general cut in. “Don’t listen to the boy, Smith, this is between you and I.”

Smith hadn’t looked away from Alex since he had spoken up. It made John’s skin crawl, and he reevaluated his earlier idea of fighting the soldier for the gun to his head; if he was quick, perhaps he could put a couple bullets in Smith before they shot him down.

“You know me, George,” he drawled, his eyes on Alex, and took a few steps away from the middle of the clearing, came to a stop just short of him. “I could never resist a pretty face.”

John was going to kill him, if it was the last fucking thing he did. The general’s thoughts ran along the same lines, if the scathing glare he directed at the side of the man’s head was anything to go by. Somewhere to his right, he saw Lafayette fidget from the corner of his eye, and Tilghman watched the events unfold with a guarded, but obviously worried expression.

“So, Hamilton,” Smith said, and- and the _fucker_ raised his gun to Alexander’s chin and trailed it along his jaw, gently, like a caress. Washington made an aborted movement as though to draw his gun before he remembered he didn’t have it anymore and took half a step, but all the soldiers who were stationed opposite them trained their guns on him as soon as he did.

John seethed in silence and bit at the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood.

“Imagine you are a handsome british general such as myself, who has managed to get his hands on the head of the enemies’ army and a few of the strays he employs. What would you do with them?” The barrel of the gun stroked along Alexander’s cheek and down his neck, came to rest on his collar-bone.

None of them moved, and John was almost sure they all held their breaths as well. The general’s fingers twitched at his side where his gun usually was, but the only thing he could do was watch that man play with his son and glare holes into his back.

“I wouldn’t kill them,” he said.

“Of course _you_ wouldn’t, they are your friends, are they not?” Smith cocked the gun to Alex’s chin again, raised his face so he could watch his expressions better. A part of John wanted to look away, didn’t want to witness Alexander being treated like this, but another irrational part of him was afraid Smith would do something worse to him as soon as he averted his eyes.

“As a british officer,” Alex began again. “I still wouldn’t kill them. As I said, there are more than enough high-ranking officers in the continental army who would salivate over a chance to become head of military. The only thing you would achieve with the general’s death is making him a martyr in the eyes of the public.”

Where on earth was he going with this? As talented as he was with his words, Alex couldn’t truly believe Smith would just let them go because someone else would take Washington’s place in case of his death.

The gun shifted, tilted Alexander’s chin up higher still.

“Go on,” Smith said, somewhere between indulgent and engaged.

“I would take a hostage,” Alex went on, and oh no. That couldn’t be what he was playing at, he couldn’t be that reckless–but the general drew in a sharp breath, and John knew they had come to the same conclusion.

“A hostage?” Smith repeated, his grin audible. “What, you want us to take his aides? Aides are far easier to replace than a Major General, kid.”

The side of Alex’s mouth twitched at Smith’s condescending tone, but he kept calm. Meanwhile, the slow climb of dread from John’s stomach up his spine and into his throat stifled him, put a pressure on his chest that made it hard to breathe. 

He couldn’t. Alexander couldn’t, not after they had almost lost him once already, he couldn’t just walk willingly into the enemy’s clutches, he couldn’t just leave them like that.

“I’m not suggesting you take his aides,” Alex said and swallowed, throat bobbing where it was stretched up by the gun. “I’m suggesting you take his son.”

John’s stomach dropped, his limbs heavy as though weighed down by thick chains. The breath he had just drawn stuck in his throat and turned to dust.

Washington’s jaw-muscles were working, strained and visible as Smith turned from Alex back to him, delighted surprise written over his features. The gun fell away from Alex’s chin, the one on the back of his head remained. It didn’t matter now, because Alexander had just signed himself over as a pawn in the little game of chess Smith was playing.

“The boy is yours, George? A bastard? On your own staff? Talk about nepotism,” he said, grinning from ear to ear like the cat who got the cream.

“He’s not mine,” the general shot back, a desperate last resort, but it wouldn’t be enough.

“Oh, isn’t he?” Smith said and looked from Washington to Alexander and back again, then shrugged and pulled a large knife from his belt. “Then I’m afraid I’ll have to bleed him dry for lying to me.”

Dear God. John watched, thoughts slow and murky, as Smith made his way back to Alex and raised the knife to his neck. Alex squirmed backwards and away from the blade, but Smith tangled his other hand in his hair and yanked his head back, baring his throat and holding him steady as he traced the edge of the blade over his skin. He didn’t put enough pressure to cut yet, but the knife was so close Alex probably couldn’t even swallow.

“Lord, put the knife down, Smith! Don’t hurt him,” Washington called, eyes wide and, Christ, scared. The knife didn’t budge from its position. “Please,” he added, and it fell away.

“I don’t appreciate being lied to,” Smith said, the playful quality gone from his words, his face serious for the first time. “Is he yours or is he not?”

The general closed his eyes, squeezed them shut tight, and balled his hands to fists at his sides. “He’s mine. Alexander is mine. Don’t hurt him. Please.”

“There we go,” Smith said, that punchable curl of his lips back on his face.

John was vaguely aware that Lafayette and Tilghman exchanged some disbelieving looks, but he couldn’t bring himself to worry about that secret being revealed when they would take Alex from them, take him and do who knows what to him in an attempt to- what? Blackmail the general into sabotaging the revolution?

“Well, your Alexander has a good head on his shoulders. He’s absolutely right, we should let you go and just take him,” he said and gestured some more soldiers over, who bound Alex’s hands on his back with thick rope and grabbed him by the arms, one on either side. The gun was lowered. It didn’t matter.

“Besides, I would love to get more closely acquainted with him.” He winked at Alexander, who just glared and looked away, caught John’s gaze instead. He must have been able to see every single emotion running behind John’s eyes, for he faltered and pressed his lips together into a thin line.

John shook his head, but he didn’t know at what exactly. Why was it always Alexander? Why did it always have to be him? Always his Alex, his love.

“We’ll be on our way then, I suppose, as you’ll be. Any last words?” he asked Alex, who was already in the process of being dragged away by the men at his sides.

Alex struggled to turn back around in the men’s grasp, to lock eyes with first John then the general one last time.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry, John. I’m sorry, Pa.”

“Adorable,” Smith commented as he mounted his horse and the soldiers manhandled Alex into the saddle in front of one of them.

The soldiers to their sides abandoned their post and mounted their own horses, and in less than thirty seconds, the whole unit had disappeared between the trees, leaving them alone–and with one man less than they had set out with.

* * *

“So, Alexander- Alex? Can I call you Alex?” Smith said. For some reason he had insisted the soldier in charge of Alex at the moment rode beside him up front, probably just so he could harass him some more.

“You may not,” Alex responded, eyes fixed stubbornly ahead of him. His shoulders started to ache due to the awkward position they had bound his arms in, and the heat of the soldier in his back was entirely unwelcome, and- and his heart was heavy, heavy with the knowledge that he’d just hurt them again. John and his father. 

There hadn’t been another way out for them. Alex needed them alive, and if their lives could only be preserved by him sacrificing his freedom, then so be it.

Smith chuckled. “I do admire your audacity, Alex. You’re a brave one, I can tell, and stubborn, just like your old man. I can’t wait to break you.”

Alex didn’t turn to look at the man, wouldn’t give him the unsettled reaction he so obviously craved, even though the beginnings of uneasiness were sprouting in the pits of his stomach.

“How quaint,” he said, schooling his features into a mask of cool disinterest. “I can’t wait to see you try.” Stupid. A stupid thing to say to someone who had already threatened to harm him and had put a knife to his throat less than ten minutes past. _Think before you speak, Alexander_ , he heard his father’s voice say somewhere in the back of his head.

“Oh, we’re going to have so much fun together, Alex,” Smith said, and Alex couldn’t help it, he glanced at him without turning his head. The man leered at him, greedy and unhinged, like he couldn’t decide if he wanted to hurt him or- well. Commit other crimes. Alex didn’t want to think about it.

He just hoped his father and John were all right, even though they had to be worried sick; and quite possibly furious with him. Alex hoped they would get a chance to chew him out soon.


	2. Day One (Part Two)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had way too much fun writing this.
> 
> Alex is petty and I'm living for it, but also? There's a reason Washington and John never (willingly lol) let him do anything alone. This boy is a dumbass. Someone help him.

This was a disaster.

Alex was probably already in enemy territory by now, and they were powerless to do anything to help or intervene.

If he had just kept his mouth shut, just this once–well, they'd most likely be dead, the lot of them. Or someone could have come up with a brilliant plan that could have prevented all of this in the ten seconds it took Smith to aim the gun and pull the trigger.

John sighed. None of this should have happened, and if it had to happen, why to Alex? Trouble found him wherever they went, and John was getting sick and tired of the fear, the worry, the loss.

"This… is bad," Burr said. They were in the general's private tent, the four of them and, for some godforsaken reason, one Aaron Burr.

Washington hadn't wanted to take this whole situation to headquarters yet; they had to formulate at least a bit of a plan first, and apart from that, the general suspected some foul play from within their own lines after what happened. He wanted to keep it quiet.

"Hamilton has… well, _all_ the information they would need to ruin us. Is there anything we can do?" he went on, rubbing at his chin, lost in thought.

"A prisoner-exchange, perhaps?" Tilghman suggested, but he sounded unsure. For good reason; they had few prisoners, and none of them as important as the chief aide. None of them as important as General Washington's son.

"They'd be stupid to agree to that," Lafayette said, without malice or his usual spirit.

"Well, we have to do _something_ ," John himself butted in. "And if we have to free all our prisoners, it doesn't matter. We need Alex back."

Burr's gaze shifted from the general, who hadn't said a word yet, to John, cool and calculating.

"Forgive me, but I don't think you should have a say in this, Laurens."

John furrowed his brow and balled his fists, took a deep breath. "Excuse me?"

“You are too affected. I don’t think you can be rational right now,” Burr explained, and Lafayette grimaced.

“Too affected?” he repeated. “How am I too affected? We all care about Alex, he’s your friend, too! All of us are affected!” John tried to keep his volume level, he did, but he got louder with every word, almost yelling the last words in Burr’s face.

“For Christ’s sake, because you love him, Laurens,” Burr shot back, the line of his mouth hard and a dim spark of anger in his eyes.

John’s eyebrow twitched and he took another breath to calm himself, but all it did was fan the fire inside him. “Of course I do, and so does Laf! He’s like a brother-”

“If I saw you kissing your brother like I saw you kiss him I would be very concerned,” Burr cut in. He hadn’t shouted, wasn’t even close to raising his voice, but the sentence rang in John’s ears like the crack of a bell. All the blood drained from his face. 

He knew. He had known, Burr had _seen them_.

He hadn’t said anything.

Tilghman looked around the room, watched the faces of everyone present, almost twitching with nervous energy. “Why- is no one surprised? Did you know about this? _Sir_?”

The general just sighed and rubbed a hand down his face. “Can we all just agree that none of this leaves this tent and focus back on what we need to do?”

“We need to stop taking Laurens’ suggestions. As I said, he’s too affected, he’s not thinking straight.”

And the shocked haze dropped from John’s vision, was replaced with a red film. “Burr, if you think I won’t punch you because we’re friends-”

“Goddamnit, John, if you can’t talk like an adult, don’t talk at all,” the general said, stopping him dead in his tracks.

“Sorry, Sir,” he mumbled and put a hand to his forehead. Maybe he _wasn’t_ thinking straight. He rarely was when it concerned Alexander.

“If Laurens is too affected, so is the general,” Tilghman spoke up again, pushing back into the conversation, and Burr frowned in confusion.

“Why would he be-”

“‘Cause Hamilton’s his. His bastard, but still his.”

“I’m sorry, _what_?” He stared back at Tilghman, eyes wide in surprise and disbelief, gave John another look, probably because he assumed he had known–which he of course had–and turned to the general. “Sir?”

The general sighed again, sounding more tired every time he did. “It’s not true,” he said.

Tilghman crossed his arms in front of himself, a defensive stance if John had ever seen one. “Sir, you said-”

“It was a ruse,” Washington cut in, an edge of impatience creeping into the words. “It was very obvious to all of us we wouldn’t get out of there alive, Hamilton did the first thing that popped into his head, as usual, and I played along because Smith put a knife to the boy’s throat, for God’s sake. What, do you think I would put my own son in such danger?”

Ouch. That must have hurt to say. 

“N-no, Sir,” Tilghman said, voice trailing off. “Sorry, Sir.”

“Good.” The general sat down on the edge of his desk, rubbed at his brow. “Burr, I need you to find whoever it was who scouted ahead today. They are either extraordinarily stupid or traitors–that was a unit of twenty men, and they were waiting for us. Impossible to miss. You know what? Lafayette, Tilghman, you go with him, I don’t want more people involved in this than are absolutely necessary. Not a word to no one.”

There was a chorus of ‘Yes, Sir,’ and the men trickled out of the tent. Burr shot him a last suspicious look John didn’t have the mental strength to unpack and Lafayette clapped him on the shoulder as he passed, gave it a tight squeeze, and shot him the fraction of his usual smile. John didn’t even attempt to return it.

Just like that, they were alone.

He perched himself on the table next to the general and watched the canvas of the tent opposite him sway in a gentle breeze. “How bad is this, Sir?”

Washington paused, linked his fingers, didn’t turn to look at John. “Bad, my boy. Very bad. I know Smith, we served together in the french and indian war. He’s a cruel man. I don’t- I can’t think about what he might do to Alex.”

John didn’t respond and closed his eyes, feeling the wetness already build behind his lids. He had suspected as much. It didn’t make hearing the confirmation any easier.

* * *

It had gotten dark out, so Alex had been sitting on the ground, tied to a tent-pole by his wrists, for quite some time now. His back ached where the wood dug into it at sharp angles, as did his shoulders, and his wrists were already raw and tender, burned by the rope and his endless fidgeting.

He had been alone for what felt like hours and had been thankful for it, but all good things had to come to an end, especially when it was a good thing happening to Alexander Hamilton–couldn’t have _that_.

Smith sauntered into the tent and lit an oil-lamp, turned it up as bright as it would go; Alex squinted against the sudden light after he had grown accustomed to darkness.

The man set something he couldn’t make out down on the desk–the tent had a desk and a single cot, like his father’s, and Alex had been trying to beat the realisation he was being kept in Smith’s own, private tent back into the bushes since it had jumped out at him. 

“How are you this fine evening, Alex? Are you hungry? I brought you some food,” Smith chattered away at him. God, he hated how that man talked, how he talked down to him, like he was a child. It made Alex feel like Smith knew something he didn’t, and that he taunted him with it.

“I don’t want anything from you,” Alex said. He was hungry. He wouldn’t eat anything that man had touched.

Smith pouted at him, the expression grossly exaggerated. “Come on, Alexander. I’m sure your father didn’t raise you to be rude to your hosts.”

Alex scoffed; he wanted Smith to stop talking about his father. His father wasn’t there, he was. “No, but my father did raise me to speak my mind, and I am of the mind that I will not accept a thing from my captor.”

There were a few beats of silence, and then a wide grin crept over Smith’s face in the yellow light, one that showed teeth and not an ounce of happiness. “I’m afraid I’m not giving you a choice, my sweet Alexander. You will eat.”

His skin broke out into goose-bumps as a deep sense of disgust hit him and sent a shiver down his spine–he had never had such an adverse reaction to being called anything, but somehow that man had made his very own name sound dirtier than _bastard_ and _whoreson_ ever could.

He forgot to answer over the sour taste in his mouth that Smith had so effortlessly conjured up out of nowhere, and Smith just grinned at him and took the plate from the desk, put it down on the ground, a safe distance away from him, where he could reach it but Alex couldn't.

He knelt down in front of Alex. They hadn’t bound his legs, so Alex kicked out when he considered Smith close enough, but the man caught his leg at the ankle in an iron grip, forced it down to the ground and sat on it, and did the same with his other leg, so he was unable to move either of them.

Alex glared up at him, shoving aside how trapped he felt, how caged, how much he hated the feeling of that man’s weight on him.

Smith dragged the plate closer–it contained a piece of bread, and he ripped a chunk off.

“Now, be a good boy and open that pretty little mouth for me, Alex,” he said and traced his fingers along Alex’s jaw, like he had done with his gun earlier that same day. Alex shook the fingers off and glared harder.

Smith smiled, indulgent, and gripped his chin tight enough it hurt, maybe to try and work his jaw open that way.

There wasn’t much Alex could do, tied to a pole and legs made useless as he was, but he could do one thing, still.

He spat in Smith’s face.

White light exploded behind his eye-lids and he bit his tongue hard as his head was thrown to the side, strands of hair that had slipped from his queue flying into his face and obscuring his sight–harsh pain bloomed across the side of his face. He tasted blood.

Alex blinked away the tears of shock and pain and stared back at Smith, who wiped his face off with his handkerchief and began folding it back up. He was still smiling.

“George really did a horrible job with you,” he said and pocketed the piece of fabric. “I don’t think he ever punished you right. He wouldn’t have hit you, would he? No. What he doesn’t realise is that troublesome young men need a guiding presence in their lives, one not afraid to discipline them properly. You’re lucky you have me now, Alex. I think we can still beat this out of you.”

What the _actual fuck_ was he going on about? He couldn’t be-

Alex’s line of thought scattered to the winds when Smith reached the hand he had just back-handed him with up and stroked the hair from his face, brushed it back behind his ear.

He bit his lip and shut his eyes. He wouldn’t cry, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t cry-

He didn’t, and instead hot anger rose from the pit of his stomach up into his chest, stuck in his throat.

How dare he. How _dare he_ touch him like that, gently, like he cared about Alex–like his father would touch him.

“Are you quite done with your little tantrum, Alex? You still need to eat,” Smith said. His hand had settled against Alexander’s neck, an uncomfortable, warm weight on his skin.

“Get your filthy hands off me and go fuck yourself,” Alex ground out.

That time, he slapped him across the face with his open palm; it only hurt a little less.

“Open your mouth,” he commanded, the smile finally gone from his features.

“Fuck you,” Alex answered.

Smith didn’t hit him again, he just looked at him with cool, bright eyes like ice. After a few moments of this, he raised his hand back to Alex’s face and covered his nose, cutting off his breathing.

Alex knew what he was doing, why he was doing it, but that didn’t mean he could keep his mouth from dropping open to gulp in much needed air after a minute or so. Smith shoved the piece of bread in and slipped his hand over his mouth, so he couldn’t spit it back out.

Alex glared, stale bread in his mouth, and didn’t move. Neither did Smith.

“If you won’t chew it yourself, I can do it for you, if you like,” he said quietly into the too small space between them.

After a considerable pause in which Alex thought that threat over, he began to chew. Smith would. He absolutely would, and Alex would rather die than have that man force-feed him bread-goo from his own mouth like an invalid.

He swallowed.

“Good boy,” Smith said, and Alex thought the single bite of bread he’d just eaten might come back up.

It went on like that for a while, entirely too long in his opinion, until the cursed piece of bread was gone. At least he had managed to waste a good portion of Smith’s time, he supposed.

When Smith finally got off his legs, the circulation in them had ceased so thoroughly Alex had to bite his lip to keep from squirming when the blood rushed back into them, his skin tingling like he had stepped in an anthill.

“I think we’ve made some good progress tonight, don’t you?” Smith said as he stripped out of his clothes for the night.

Alex looked away. He had no intentions of engaging him any further.

Smith turned back around to him and fixed him with a long stare as he dropped his shirt to the ground. “When I ask you a question, you answer, Alexander. Is that understood?”

Alex kept silent, just to piss him off.

Something in Smith’s eyes shifted; he strode back over to him and kicked him in the ribs, then was gone again. The breath was knocked out of him as the sharp pain exploded between his ribs, ebbed away and leaked into the surrounding areas, and Alex curled in to himself, stifling a hiss of pain between his teeth.

“Sorry, sweetheart, but someone’s oughta teach you,” he said and put out the lamp, leaving them in darkness, him on his cot and Alex on the ground, most of his body hurting in one way or the other, shame and humiliation thrumming hot beneath his skin.


	3. Day Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> John is fucking PISSED and Alex is so not having fun in this chapter.

“So, uh, you and Hamilton, huh?”

John raised his eyes slowly from the letter he was bent over, a letter he could have recited word for word, one he’d read way too many times.

“Tench, I will kill you in your sleep,” he said. He was tired, he was sad, he was fucking pissed, and he was trying to _do something for fuck’s sake_ , and Tilghman chose that moment to start an awkward conversation.

Shit, he was starting to sound like the general, throwing out murder-threats like ‘good morning’s.

Tilghman raised his hands in surrender and actually backed up a bit. “Sorry. I’m just trying to process it all.”

John sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. Washington and he shouldn’t have stayed up all night, they’d achieved nothing in the end, anyway; it was just hard to walk away from the situation, especially when every place John could walk off to offered nothing but a crushing lack of Alexander.

When the letter arrived just after nightfall, he had known he wouldn’t know peace for the entire night, and neither would the general.

God, the letter. John could hear the self-satisfied drawl of the man who had written it echoing in his head every time he read it anew. Smith had insane demands. He wanted them to damn the continental army to chaos, to split up units and scatter them so they were easy game for the redcoats, to send false reports to the other generals, to falsify statements to congress that would throw everything off balance.

He wanted them to pay for Alex in their own blood. If it had just been John, he would have agreed in a heartbeat, but this was about thousands of men–they couldn’t do it. They couldn’t sacrifice an army for one man, no matter how much they wanted to.

So, John searched for something, _anything_ they could do, anything at all. It was clear they wouldn’t get Alex back by playing by british rules–they had to make their own.

“Can you maybe process later and help me find a way to get him out of there?”

Tilghman looked at him with something like pity in his eyes. If he kept looking at him like that, John would have to punch him.

“We’re trying, Laurens. But it’s not like we can do what Smith wants. His demands are outrageous, and Hamilton is just one man, and not even a very important one in the grand scheme of things–I mean military-wise!” he hastened to add when he saw John’s glower. Alexander was the most important man on this thrice-damned earth where John was concerned, and he would get him back or die trying.

He was spared from formulating a further response when Burr pushed the tent-flap aside and nodded to them both; his eyes caught on the letter in John’s hands, and he closed them, resigned. John hadn't let go of the letter in hours, and he wasn’t about to. He needed to come up with something.

“It turns out we had some british spies in our midst,” he said, and John exchanged a glance with Tilghman before both of them looked back at Burr, expectant. “I would say we were lucky they didn’t make it to a higher rank before being found out, but we really aren’t. They were too close to causing significant damage–if it wasn’t for Hamilton, the general would be dead, and the army in disarray.”

John sighed and folded the letter back up, but didn’t put it away. “What will happen to them?” he said, half-hearted. He didn’t really care, if he was being honest. The damage was done, Alex was in enemy hands, and nothing they could do to the men who caused it would bring him back.

Burr smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “The general ordered their execution as soon as it became clear they didn’t know anything useful. They are most likely already dead.”

“And how’s the general?” Tilghman asked, fingers pulling at a loose thread on his sleeve, a nervous movement.

“Not great. Scattered,” Burr said. His gaze settled back on John where he sat on the ground, and so did Tilghman’s–he had a feeling he knew what that was about.

He was right. 

“Was it the truth? What Hamilton said? Are they- Is he?” Tilghman said, the side of his mouth turned down, eyes flickering to and from his face like he didn’t want to meet his gaze, but knew he was supposed to.

John blinked up at the both of them. Burr schooled his expression into one of measured neutrality, but he could tell he wanted to know the answer just as much as Tilghman did. Well, they wouldn’t hear it from him. It wasn’t his place.

“No,” he said. The lie rolled smoothly off his tongue, and he looked both men in the eyes in turn. “It’s not true. They are close. Not that close. Can we go back to the task at hand now?”

They weren’t satisfied with his answer, he could tell, but he didn’t care. This discussion was a stupid one, one that didn’t need to happen now, one that could wait until Alexander was safely back with them again.

“Sure. Do you have an idea?” Burr said with raised eyebrows, challenging. 

John closed his eyes and lowered his head, the letter heavy in grasp. No, he didn’t. He didn’t have an inkling on what they could do, he didn’t know how to help Alex, how to get him back, he just didn’t _know_ ; and it was tearing him apart.

* * *

That night, Alex’s scenery changed for a bit; he wound up tied to a chair by his feet, at Smith's desk, the table emptied of any important documents or things he could have used as weapons. No letter-opener, nothing but ink and a quill. Even the oil-lamp had moved to a wooden box just out of his reach.

Alex sat there, back straight even though it hurt to sit like that after more than twenty-four hours slumped on the ground, and stared down at the blank piece of parchment in front of him.

"What exactly am I supposed to do here?" he asked, voice flat.

Smith hovered somewhere behind him, too close, if the nervous prickle on the back of his neck was anything to go by, and it took everything in him not to turn around to see where he was, what he was doing.

"I'm glad you asked, Alex," he said, and fuck, he sounded nearer than Alex wanted him to be. "You see, yesterday evening I had someone bring a little letter to your father. Over a day later, I still haven't received word back–rude, wouldn’t you say? I thought maybe we could coax a reaction out of him if we tried again together."

That man didn't waste any time, huh.

"So," he went on. "I recite and you write. I hear you are quite good at that, Alex."

Alex scowled at the empty parchment. "And if I don't want to?"

There was a sound behind him, metal scraping on leather–a dagger being unsheathed. Shit.

"I am thrilled you asked," Smith said, the twisted, infuriating grin on his face audible.

A hand stroked along his nape, and Alex jumped, to his chagrin. Smith chuckled and pulled the piece of fabric Alex had used to tie his hair back free and let it flutter to the ground, carded his fingers through his tangled curls, and Alex shivered. He squirmed in his seat, legs flexing against the scratchy rope that bound them, and tried to twist his head away, but Smith’s grip only tightened until it hurt his scalp.

He stilled. Smith dragged his hand through his hair, worked out knots, not really intent on hurting him, but he wished he was. Alex couldn’t take this, this almost gentle touch. John would play with his hair like that, and Smith had no right, no right at all to put his hands on him like that, _like John would_.

The fingers slipped from his hair, but the relief was short-lived; the hand closed around his wrist instead, too quick for him to react, and Smith slammed his hand down to the table. He bit back the wince. He wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

"If you don't want to, well. I have other ideas through which to let your father hear from you. Maybe we could start with a few fingers, what do you think?” Smith pressed his wrist to the table harder and brought the knife closer, too close, and Alex curled his fingers into the palm of his hand. “Do you think daddy would like that? At least he'd get a part of you back." 

Pa wouldn’t like that one bit, and neither would Alex. He needed his fingers, he really, really needed them. He couldn’t just let some lunatic take them from him.

His hand tensed further as the dagger inched closer still, his knuckles white and his arm trembling up to the point where Smith held it down. He hissed at the bite of cold metal in his skin and watched as the blade drew a red line across the back of his hand–it didn’t slice deep, but still blood leaked out and formed little beads along the cut, like some kind of twisted pearl-necklace.

“Or maybe he wouldn’t even want you back without them. He wouldn’t have any real use for you if you can’t write, after all.”

Alex swallowed and concentrated on his breathing, began counting along with it like Pa had taught him years ago–cold fear had his heart in a tight grip, squeezing like the hand around his wrist, but he couldn’t let it become full blown panic. _Breathe through the pain, acknowledge you’re scared, and keep a level head, Alexander._

“Then you would lose your bargaining-chip,” he said, and damn him, his voice shook.

“Ha!” Smith said and lifted the knife from his hand, slid it back into the sheath, and let go of his wrist, but Alex still didn’t move an inch. He didn’t take anything Smith offered at face value–the man was unhinged, unpredictable. “What a clever boy you are.” 

Two hands settled heavy on his shoulders, and Alex dug his teeth into his lip to keep from jumping again. He concentrated on his counting, but his breath stuttered from time to time, became uneven, and there was no way Smith hadn’t noticed; fuck, he was playing right into his hands, letting him throw him off, reacting to his attempts to unsettle him.

One of the hands stroked up his neck, warm, rough fingers trailing slowly over his skin, and gripped the juncture of his jaw and his neck, tilted his head back and made it even more difficult to breathe. The other slid off his shoulder and down to his chest, splayed out on top of it and shoved him back against the chair.

Alex was pinned.

Warm puffs of air hit his ear- oh God, he was too close, way too close, and Alex was _trapped-_

“Maybe I could take your tongue,” Smith whispered, dry lips brushing the shell of his ear. “That way you could still do your work, but you would be a lot less trouble. George would probably thank me for it.”

Alex squeezed his eyes shut and bit down on his lip hard, focused on the pain to distract himself from the man’s arms around him, his hands on him, his words lodging themselves in his brain, his cursed breath against his ear.

His heart hammered away inside his chest as if searching for a way out, and he was all too aware Smith could feel just how fast it was.

A sigh hit the side of his face. “But then again, I wouldn’t enjoy you half as much without it. How about we write that letter first and see where it takes us, hm, Alex?”

“Yes,” he choked out past the fingers around his throat. His hand burned, his eyes burned, all the places Smith’s body touched his burned–he wanted him gone, he wanted him _off_.

Smith chuckled, dark and without joy. “Yes, what?”

A sour taste settled on Alex’s tongue as he pressed out, “Y-yes, Sir.”

“Good boy,” he said and retreated, but Alex had no time to feel relieved. He came to stand beside him, so Alex could watch him draw the dagger again, twirl it in his hands lazily, like a promise.

“Pick up the quill, Alex,” Smith commanded, a smile on his face but not in his eyes–and Alex did.

Smith played with him as he wrote. He recited nonsense demands for Alex to jot down, taunts, jabs at Alex that had him clench his teeth and glare at his own writing; and all the while, he let the knife drift over his arms, never with enough pressure to do serious damage, but just enough to draw blood, enough for it to sting and burn and distract him.

“Focus, Alex. You set a wrong comma there,” Smith said, scolding him as if the bastard had any right to, like he wasn’t the one dragging the blade over Alex’s skin.

Alex looked at what he just wrote–the comma _was_ wrong. 

Blood dripped from the tips of his fingers onto the parchment, and his heart sank. His father was going to read this, John was going to read this, and they would see his handwriting, and his blood, and not know what happened. They would imagine the worst, him bleeding out over the parchment, him in pain and forced to write his captors words, scared and on his own.

That was probably what Smith wanted, why he had him do this in the first place. He wanted them to worry, to make a rash decision, to let themselves be guided by their emotions instead of reason.

He penned down the closing words and sat, unmoving, the quill clutched bloodied in his hand, and let his eyes drift over the pages he had just written. They were a mess of ink and blood, some lines crooked because he was too distracted to write them straight, some words indecipherable under a splotch of red.

“Aren’t you going to sign it?” Smith said and watched, tantalised, as the tip of the knife split the skin of Alex’s wrist, watched the blood bead and run down his arm.

Alex sighed and put his signature at the bottom of the page. He wouldn’t fight Smith over that. It was a stupid thing to fight him about, his overall situation considered.

“That should do it,” he said and wiped the knife off on Alex’s shoulder, and Alex pressed his mouth into a thin line and held his tongue. He wouldn’t argue back at a man who enjoyed to watch him suffer while said man still had that knife.

The cuts themselves weren’t even too painful, but there were so _many_. The small stings all over his arms and hands added up, molded together into a sharp and painful fire that covered his skin, and he was still bleeding. He didn’t know how much blood he’d lost, but at the moment, any amount at all was too much.

God, he was tired.

“Look at yourself, Alex,” Smith said and shook his head in disapproval, tutted at him. “You’ve made such a mess.”

Alex blinked up at him. A multitude of snarky comebacks lay on the tip of his tongue, but Smith had just sheathed the knife, and he didn’t want to give him a reason to bring it back out.

The man didn’t seem to mind too much, though. He had the impression Smith was going to say the same thing either way, if Alex spoke in between or not.

He stepped back behind Alex, out of his sight, but he was keenly aware of his presence, still; Smith wasn’t easy to ignore, he had learned, especially when one was his source of entertainment at the moment.

His hands were back in his hair, pulling it away from his face, combing it back over his shoulders, and Alex closed his eyes. He felt his brow crinkle, his mouth twist, and he bit at his lip; the tears gathered on his eyelashes, but he couldn’t, he wouldn’t, not in front of that disgusting man. Smith would probably love to see him cry, but Alex _wouldn’t_ , but-

He hurt all over, and he knew his arms would bear scars from this if he lived to see the day, and he would see them and think of Smith and what he did to him–and he was bleeding, and that asshole was petting his hair like he was some kind of animal, and the letter he just wrote with his own hands would do nothing but hurt John and Pa further, when they were already worried because of him, and scared, and it was all his own damn fault-

He swallowed and blinked his eyes back open, let out a long breath, counted to ten. The maelstrom of emotions slowed and shrunk inside his chest until he could pretend it wasn’t there. He was fine. It was fine.

“Red suits you,” Smith remarked, trailing a hand down his arm. “You should wear red. It goes way better with your complexion than the blue does.” He arrived at his forearm and dragged his fingers through the fresh blood, smeared it over the already crusted remainders of the beginning of the night. Alex couldn’t watch. His stomach turned even at the feeling, those horrible fingers smudging the warm, sticky liquid along his burning arm.

“And go against my father?” he said. His voice sounded shaky, but not like he was on the brink of a meltdown. That was good enough, he supposed.

Smith hummed. “Daddy isn’t always going to be there, Alex. You will have to become your own person someday, I’m afraid.”

Alex grit his teeth and curled his fingers around the edge of the table; the movement sent a ripple of hurt along the length of his arm. “What is your problem with my father, anyway?”

The hand on his arm stilled. “The only problem I have with your father,” he said, his playful drawl replaced by a flat seriousness. “is that he is a brilliant man on the wrong side of history. You wouldn’t want to end up like that, would you, my Alexander?”

The blood still in his veins boiled. The nerve of that man, the audacity, to pretend he knew his father and in the same breath claim some kind of ownership of Alex. “I’m not your _anything_ , Smith. I don’t belong to you, and I resent that you seem to think I do.”

The hand that hovered unmoving on his arm closed around it suddenly, like a vice, fingers digging into the cuts, and the pain shot up to his shoulder and down to his finger-tips in an instant. Something that sounded like a dry sob broke from his throat, and his other hand clasped at Smith's wrist weakly, tried to dislodge it without success; he didn't even budge.

"I think you would do good to remember who's in charge here, Alex. The only reason you're still in one piece and aware enough to be a brat is my newly discovered streak of mercy.” The hand closed further around his arm, and the blood dripped from Smith’s too tight fingers down to the ground. Alex turned his face away, afraid he wouldn’t be able to hold back the tears. 

“You highly overestimate your own value to me–yes, I can use you to keep your father in line, but I _know him_. If I were to send him your pretty little head in a box, he would fall apart and the whole army with him. Do remember that the next time you are about to be overcome by the urge to raise your voice at me."

The hand released him abruptly, and Alex drew his arm close to his chest, slumped over in the chair and curled into himself. His hair obscured his face like that, and he let a few of the tears fall, scrubbed them away so Smith wouldn’t notice.

God, it hurt, and Smith was still there, he wouldn’t leave him alone, because this was his own fucking tent and no one would stop him from doing to Alex as he pleased, and- he wanted to go home.

He wanted to be woken up by John, John who would look at him with kind, loving eyes, like he mattered, and he’d tell him he’d had a nightmare, and that everything was fine, and he could just go and find Pa, and he would be safe.

But this wasn’t a dream, and he was alone.

Smith grabbed him by the hair again and forced him back up, put the other hand to his cheek–it was the one that had been on his arm, the one covered in blood. 

Alex stared back into those cold eyes, exhausted. It was like staring down the barrel of a gun.

“You have his eyes,” he said, and Alex felt sick. “Maybe we could send him one of those. Do you think he would recognise it?”

“Probably,” Alex said with a dry mouth. He didn’t think further than that.

Smith hummed and let go of him, and Alex dropped back against the chair this time. The man moved away, ruffled around in something, then his presence was back behind him, and he forced his arms together and tied them at the wrists.

“Good night, Alex,” he said into his ear, and he shivered.

The light died and he was left in the dark.


	4. Day Three (Part One)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No one has a good time and nothing is safe, sane and consensual.

The new day came too quick and at the same time not fast enough. John had forced himself into a fitful sleep, too exhausted to stay up the second night in a row, but too worked up to find any real rest or peace of mind–so he welcomed the first rays of the sun announcing a new day as much as he despised them.

It had been three days since Alex had been taken, and they were no closer to getting him back than they had been the night that dreadful letter arrived.

John scrubbed a hand down his tired face, stretched in an attempt to get the blood flowing, and made his way to the general’s tent. He would be awake, John knew, most likely had been for an hour at least, and in a similar state of mind as himself.

He knocked on the tent-post, called a greeting so Washington would know it was him, and entered without having received any permission to do so; he could remember a time in his life when he would rather have eaten his own boots than commit such a blatant act of disrespect, but that was long past. The general and he had come to an understanding, one that didn’t involve those kinds of petty formalities.

The sight that greeted him threw him back a couple of weeks, to _that_ day, when they had thought Alexander dead. The general sat at his desk, unnaturally still, elbows on the table and forehead leaned against his joined hands, eyes closed–he looked like he was in prayer, but he probably wasn’t. He rarely ever prayed.

“Sir?” John said and let the tent-flap fall closed behind him with a soft rustling of canvas.

Washington lowered his hands, crossed his arms on the table, and looked up at him. His face was pale, the bags under his eyes a bruised purple, and his eyes themselves blood-shot, like he hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep that night. It wouldn’t surprise John.

“John, I-” he began, but broke off, swallowed, closed his eyes. “There- Another letter was delivered, just about an hour ago. Look,” he said and pried his eyes back open, put his hand down atop a few pages and shoved them to the edge of the table blindly, without sparing them a glance.

John’s stomach sank, even before he reached out to take them. After the last one, he doubted anything good would come of it. Keeping the general’s shellshocked state in mind, he took several deep breaths and prepared himself for the worst as he picked up the pages.

At his first glance down, his heart stopped. His limbs went numb, his blood turned to ice, his lungs stuttered and gave out inside his ribcage.

That was Alex’s handwriting. The page was specked with dried, brown blood.

He thumbed through the rest, dazed, and his sight blurred the farther he got–Alexander’s usually quick but precise writing was slurred in places, there were spots of ink as if he had stopped without lifting the quill from the parchment, some of the lines were askew, even, and the blood- there was more on every new page turned than there was on the last. More and more, like he had been made to bleed harder the longer he wrote.

The pages almost slipped from John’s limp fingers as he lowered them without having read a single word besides the smudged ‘A. Ham’ at the end.

His breath hitched, but he blinked the tears from his eyes. John had no right to cry, Alex was the one hurt, and he needed their help, he needed them to do something _._

“Sir. What do we do?” he said and cleared his throat, trying to rid it of the raspiness.

The general didn’t answer, didn’t even look at him.

John pressed his lips together and slapped the letter back down onto the table, overcome by the sudden feeling that he shouldn’t be touching it, that he didn’t want to be touching it.

“Sir,” he bit out, more forceful this time. “We need to act now.”

Washington’s own hand slammed into the table like a clap of thunder and he glared up at him with tired, sunken-in eyes and a twist of his lips that was almost a sneer. 

“What can we do, John? If you have come up with a brilliant plan overnight, now would be a good time to share it. We can’t do a single thing Smith wants, not a single one! What do you want us to _do_?”

John swallowed around the lump in his throat and forced himself to return the general’s gaze, sparking with anger and despondency, even as his own eyes filled with tears again.

“Something. Anything. We need to start proper negotiations, or send someone in to get Alex out, or- I don’t know, Sir, but there has to be _something,_ ” he said. His voice was saturated with desperation, and he knew no one would take anything he said seriously in the state he was in, least of all someone as pragmatic as the general usually was.

Washington furrowed his brow, expression pained, and averted his eyes. “Smith won’t negotiate. He holds all the cards. He wins either way, if we do what he wants or if we don’t. Alex has more than enough information, and Smith knows how to extract it, and- and then he would-” he didn’t finish the thought, but he didn’t have to. “He knows it would be the final blow to me. He knows I couldn’t live with myself after- _that_.”

John swallowed, took a step closer to Washington. “Then we send someone in.”

The general sighed and rubbed at his tense brow. “A suicide-mission. We don’t know where they are keeping him, the camp is too vast, their numbers too big. Besides, even if I were to be convinced to agree to something so reckless, if it were to be discovered... the second Smith thought something was off, he would have Alex- he wouldn’t let him alive.”

He hissed out a breath through his teeth. Of course it was easy for the general to shoot every single one of John’s poorly conceptualised ideas down when he hadn’t voiced one of his own. 

“So, what do you suggest?”

Washington was still for a long moment. When he looked back up at him, he looked ashen, uncertain, torn. 

“I can’t do this, John,” he said, the closest to a whisper John had ever heard him speak. “I can’t make a decision on this. As a commander, I know I can’t sacrifice troops for one man, I can’t send good people to their certain deaths for an aide, I can’t waste men and resources on a suicide-mission. I can’t sabotage this war, not when the fates of hundreds of thousands of innocents hinge on the revolution being a success.” He paused, gaze drifting aimlessly before it caught on the bloody pages on the desk. 

“But as a father… I would give all that and more if it meant I would get my son back. I would damn this whole country and everyone in it if I had to.” He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly, his eyes wet with unshed tears, like John’s. “I can’t act as both a commander and a father in this. And I will always be Alexander’s father first, so-”

“So what, Sir?” he said. It was a struggle to get the words out; his brain swam with doubt, hurt, loss, desperation, fear, and his throat closed up from the weight of all the emotions pressing in around him.

Washington hesitated and took some time to gather his thoughts. “I will write back to Smith. I will grovel, I will beg on my knees, I will tell him what he already knows: I can’t give him what he wants, but I can give him something else.”

John shook his head, and a few tears fell from his eyes. He wiped at them roughly with the back of his hand; there was no time for that. “No, Sir-”

The general stared back at him, resolute and determined, and _fuck_ if John hadn’t seen that exact expression on Alexander’s face a thousand times before. “I will offer up my life in exchange for Alexander’s. He will have to take that deal.”

“Sir,” John ground out, barely keeping the anger and betrayal swirling inside him in check. “If you do, all this would have been for nothing. Sacrificing yourself would damn the revolution-”

“It won’t have been for nothing, my boy. All of you will still be alive by the end of it,” Washington cut in; he appeared calmer than he had all morning. “And this war can be won without me. I will make preparations, put things in order, leave instructions. Someone else will take up the torch, and you and Alex will be there to see to it–that’s all that matters to me.”

“Sir-” he tried again, but Washington wouldn’t have it.

“Dismissed,” he said, firm but gentle, so John shut his mouth, nodded once, and left.

He wouldn’t let the general do anything along those lines, not as long as he could still form a coherent thought and stand on his own two feet.

John would have to act soon. He went back to his tent, intending to sleep for another couple hours. Nightfall would arrive fast, and by then he had to be rested and alert, because he _would_ get Alex back–or die trying.

* * *

Smith woke before he did, and Alex tried not to think too hard about that. He didn’t want to imagine what the man could have done to him if he so fancied while he was unawares, considering the things he did to him when he was awake.

The night’s rest had done nothing to replenish Alex’s strength, unfortunately; he felt weak and frail, probably the after-effects of all the blood he had lost, his joints ached and his arms stung with the slightest movement. His skin itched under the crust of dried blood. 

The cuts were ill cared for, not that he had expected anything else as a prisoner, but still–he didn’t need to be a doctor to know putting an unwashed hand to an open wound was never the best course of action, and Smith had dug his revolting fingers right in there last night. Knowing his luck, they would get infected.

“For this fine morning, I thought we could do something fun. A game, of sorts,” Smith said from somewhere behind him. The man just loved sneaking around behind Alex’s back, loved Alex not being able to see him, and he was getting tired of it.

“Great,” Alex said, with as little enthusiasm as he could manage–that was very little. He was in short supply at the moment.

Smith stepped close to him, a rolled up piece of parchment in his hand, and spread it out on the table in front of Alex. His eyes widened in recognition, and he inhaled sharply.

“The game is called ‘drawing up the supply-lines of the continental army’. You are the only player,” he said and patted Alex on the head like a fucking dog.

Alex couldn't come up with a reply; his thoughts were running off in every conceivable direction as his eyes roamed over the map of the surrounding area, but merged into a single point in the end: he couldn't. He couldn't give up valuable information like that, he couldn't betray their efforts like that, he couldn’t give the man what he wanted.

If he didn’t, if he refused–Smith would take his fingers, or perhaps his whole hand.

No, flat out refusing wouldn’t work, but Smith would also know if he just made something up on the spot; he knew how military supply-lines operated and how they planned their routes. He would take a single look and call his bluff if he put down random nonsense-

But. They had retired their old routes recently–the new ones weren’t even quite two weeks old yet.

“Fine,” he said, and Smith cut his arms free.

Alex moved them forwards and up into his lap carefully, shoulders twinging as he did, and had a look at the damage in daylight. He couldn’t make out much under all that mess of flaking crust, but what he could see wasn’t good. Perhaps he was imagining things, but he thought a few cuts already looked inflamed.

“You know I love spending time with you, Alex, but I have more important things to do today. If you could get to it?”

Alex rolled his eyes with a snort and reached for the quill; a hand shot up and buried itself in his hair, yanked his head back until he had to meet Smith’s eyes above him. He winced at the sharp pain and grasped the fabric of his breeches, suppressing the urge to grab for that hand and pry it off.

“What was that?” he said with narrowed eyes, unsmiling.

Alex wanted to look away, to look anywhere else, but he held his gaze even as his heart went through a nervous stutter in his chest, and he gingerly placed a hand on his arm where he could still feel the imprint of those fingers from last night.

“Yes, Sir,” he said, quietly, and Smith pulled his hand from his hair and crossed his arms in front of himself instead.

“It’s a good thing you’re so pretty, Alex. No one would keep you around for just your personality, you know. People don’t like little brats,” he remarked, off-hand like he wasn’t stabbing at Alex’s every insecurity. “Get on with it, then.”

Alex picked up the quill and began drawing the familiar lines into the map, lines he had stared at and poured over for countless hours–and lines that were obsolete, no longer in use.

It didn’t take long and he was done, put the quill back and laid his hands down in his lap; he didn’t turn to look at Smith. It wouldn’t have done him any good, anyway, because Smith stepped away from his side and back behind him.

Hands appeared on his shoulders in an uncomfortable echo of the night before, and they gripped him tight as Smith bent down to mumble into his hair, breath ghosting over the side of his face.

“Do you think me a fool, Alexander?”

Oh, no. No–he couldn’t know, there was no way he would know the routes were old, it was too recent of a development. He was bluffing, he had to be, Alex just had to play it cool.

“I think many things of you, but I don’t think you a fool,” he answered, eyes fixed to the map and shoulders tense beneath those hands.

“Oh? Do you not?” Smith said. His tone was too casual; his fingers dug into his muscles harder, hard enough to leave bruises. “Then why are you trying to deceive me like this, Alex? I know you lot don’t use those any longer.”

Alex kept breathing as his chest constricted, he kept breathing as his lungs struggled to take in air. Smith couldn’t know, he shouldn’t, there was _no way_ , except-

“Our spies haven’t yet been able to get their hands on the new routes, and they missed their last check-in, anyway. Your father probably found them. I thought you might be of some assistance.” He heaved a disappointed sigh, exaggerated like every other emotion he tried to convey. “But, alas. I was wrong. You lied to me, Alex, you lied to my face with not an ounce of shame–you will understand that I cannot let that go.”

Alex didn’t answer, just swallowed. His throat was suddenly dry, as though he hadn’t had a drink of water in days instead of hours, and his hands began trembling in his lap.

Smith sighed again and lifted his hands from his shoulders, dragged one through Alex’s hair instead as he stepped back into his field of vision. Alex didn’t turn his head to meet his eye, just counted along with his breathing silently.

“Let’s hope you will learn your lesson the first time,” Smith said and was gone. He left the tent, and two different soldiers entered in his stead.

Alex glanced at them once and lowered his gaze back to his lap. They cut his legs loose, and he kicked out at the one to his left, but the man just let out a mildly annoyed breath at his weak attempt. They wrenched him up from the chair and dragged him from the tent; his legs barely cooperated, and Alex stumbled more than he walked and would have fallen multiple times if it weren’t for the men’s tight grips on his arms.

He squinted up at the blue sky above–he hadn’t seen that in almost three days, Alex realised, but the thought was distant as the soldiers pulled him past neat rows of tents and finally came to a stop at a tall wooden pole.

One of the men shoved Alex to his knees and bound his wrists again, looped the rope through a metal ring above his head and secured it there; a knife was drawn behind him, then the sound of ripping cloth reached his ears, a breeze hit his back–they had cut away his shirt.

They would whip him.

Alex put his forehead to the rough wood in front of him and breathed deeply. A heavy weight had settled in his stomach, dense and cold like metal, and it sprouted branches that grew up, all the way into his chest, stabbed through his heart and curled around his lungs–every breath he drew was more difficult, more painful than the last.

They would _whip_ him. Those wounds could take up to months to heal–if they were well taken care of, that was–and no one there gave a flying fuck about him, they wouldn’t clean them, they wouldn’t dress them, they would let them get infected and they would let it kill him in the end.

“We’ll start with twenty, I think. The boy can take it, he’s stubborn.” He heard Smith’s nerve-wrecking voice say from somewhere behind him, as usual.

Twenty. He could take twenty, probably. He had to.

Alex closed his eyes and reminded himself why he was there in the first place as the dread threatened to overtake him. He had done this for John, for Pa. They were safe and alive because he was right where he was, on his knees and awaiting the first lick of the whip.

He would endure anything if it was the price of their wellbeing.

Alex heard the first crack before he felt it, and he yelped, more from the shock than the pain. A stripe of liquid fire burned along his back, but he breathed through it, clamped his lower lip between his teeth and resolved to not make another sound if he could help it.

The blows rained down in even intervals, like the beat of a song he couldn’t hear. 

By the fifth, he let out quiet whimpers. His back was aflame with pain, but it was still bearable.

By the tenth, blood dripped from his lip, he was biting down on it so hard. His back was wet, slick with more blood.

By the fifteenth lick of the whip, he screamed, strained against the rope that bound his arms, tried to squirm away from the steady flow of punishing blows to his flayed back, but it had no use.

When they finally reached twenty, his vision swam with tears, and sweat, and black dots. Smith’s words sounded muffled to him, like his head was wrapped in cotton.

“Do five more.”

Twenty-one struck, and Alex sobbed.

By twenty-five, the black dots claimed his sight, all sounds faded to a dull hum, the metallic scent of blood that hung heavy in the air fell away, and with it went the copper taste of his split lip. The last thing he was aware of was the pain that tore at his back, that covered the whole of it; but a second later there was nothing, nothing but sweet oblivion, and Alex welcomed it gladly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :)


	5. Day Three (Part Two)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In today's episode of this shitshow: John has no idea what the fuck he's doing.

If this worked out, if John managed to live long enough to see this through to the end, Washington would have every right to discharge him from the army; or even execute him, but he liked to think he wouldn’t go that far, if just for Alexander’s sake.

John was doing it for his son, after all, for their Alex, and to quote the asshole who caused all this himself: all was fair in love and war.

That was what John told himself as he snuck away from the general’s private tent unnoticed, the folded up piece of parchment he had just snatched from the desk secure in his coat-pocket. 

The general was busy at headquarters, John had slunk by there just to make sure the man was nowhere near his tent, and, as luck would have it, he had already penned the letter to Smith–just hadn’t sent it yet. He wasn’t done with whatever he thought he had to prepare first.

Good thing he had already written it, though, because John wouldn’t be a fraction as believable if he waltzed up to the enemy’s camp without word from the general himself.

John moved around camp like he usually would, doing nothing to raise any suspicion from anyone, but his heart still beat quicker than it should. He made it to the makeshift stables eventually, where he was greeted by a bored young soldier standing guard for the night.

He stood at attention when he recognised John, and John smiled awkwardly.

“Lieutenant Colonel Laurens. What brings you here at this hour?” the boy said.

John shifted from one foot to the other and buried his hands in his coat-pockets, fingers curling around the letter.

“Urgent correspondence from the general. I am to leave right now,” he said and felt a little bad when the boy nodded and disappeared to get him a horse. He hoped he wouldn’t get the kid in trouble with this; he _was_ one of Washington’s aides. It wasn’t unusual for one of them to be sent out with correspondence at odd hours, so they couldn’t fault him for believing John.

The boy came back out and handed him the reins of a dark-brown mare. “Safe journey,” he said, and John gave a thankful nod and swung himself into the saddle, a slight twinge of guilt tugging at his conscience. He would have to apologise to him after this. Well, if there was to be an ‘after this’ for John.

He shrugged that thought off, steered the horse out of camp and set course for enemy territory.

The lights of a military camp at night soon came into view, and he stopped and dismounted a good distance away. John would walk the rest, the reins in one hand and the other free to be raised in surrender as soon as he came close enough for them to spot him - he hoped they wouldn’t just decide to open fire before he was in talking-range.

They didn’t. They let him get close enough to be able to see the faces of the ten or so men who had gathered at the gap in the palisades to point their guns at him.

“What do you want?” a broad man with a red mustache asked gruffly.

“I’m Lieutenant Colonel John Laurens, one of General Washington’s aides. I have correspondence for General Smith,” he said, keeping his voice calm and level. He was a messenger, he had no personal stakes in this as far as they knew. No reason to be nervous.

The men exchanged some looks he couldn’t interpret in the dark, and some lowered their weapons.

The soldier who had spoken looked him up and down once before he answered. “Fine. Hand it over and be on your way.”

Ha, you thought. He hadn’t broken all of the rules and his general’s trust only to be stopped at the gates; he had to see Alexander, he _would_ see Alexander.

“I’m afraid I have strict instructions to only give this letter up to General Smith himself,” John said and flashed a polite smile, knowing full well it would only piss him off.

The man heaved an annoyed sigh and gestured to the other soldiers around him. “You heard the man, he wants to talk to the general. Search him and give him an escort, if you would.” With that, he turned and walked away. What an inspiring leader, John thought, as a man came forward, took the reins of his horse from him and tied them to a conveniently placed wooden pole nearby. Two others patted him down, hands rough and careless on his body, shoving underneath his coat and along the hem of his breeches.

The rest kept their guns trained on him until their comrades finished searching him, and, having found nothing, told them to return to their posts.

One of the two fell into step in front of him, the other behind, and John did his best to memorise the route they were taking. Perhaps that would come in handy; perhaps not. His plan only went as far as getting him in. Getting Alex out, well–he would have to come up with something. First, he had to see what condition he was in.

They were headed to the middle of the camp, so he assumed they would take him to the command-tent, but they stopped in front of a regular sized one; nothing like headquarters, where all of the aides could fit into and work at once without problem.

John blinked in confusion and tried to catch the eye of either of the men with him, but they wouldn’t return his gaze.

“Is this his private tent?” he asked no one in particular, as neither would acknowledge him.

“Yes,” the one now to his right said, and didn’t elaborate. John shrugged. It didn’t matter where they were, it just mattered that he got to talk to Smith; the less people present, the better. Maybe this was a good thing.

“So… do I just knock, or-”

The one to his left, who was yet to say a single word to him, sighed and stepped forward, knocked on the wooden tent-post thrice and called, “Sir, one of Washington’s aides is here to deliver correspondence.”

There was a pause, then the tent-flap was pushed aside and Smith stood before him.

John’s lips curled into a sneer of their own accord when he locked eyes with that man–the man who had taken Alex, who had hurt him. He forced his features to relax and shoved his balled fists into his pockets to conceal them; he pointedly did not stand at attention, unlike the two soldiers flanking him.

“General Smith,” he said, his voice cool and words careful. “I’m Lieutenant Colonel John Laurens, I-”

“Have correspondence?” Smith interrupted with raised brows, regarding him like he thought him nothing more than a child. His fists curled tighter. “It took George long enough to get back to me. Has he finally made up his mind if he wants the boy back or not?”

The corner of John’s mouth twitched, his mask slipping, and he took a deep breath to steady himself. “You haven’t exactly made it easy for us. As I was about to say, I have a letter from General Washington. He wants to strike up a deal, but I will need to see Alexander first.” His foot shifted, swiped a line into the dry dirt, and it drew Smith’s attention. He made a conscious effort to stay still.

“Oh? I wasn’t aware you were in the position to make demands, boy,” Smith said. The derisive smirk on his face almost seemed to invite John to bash it in.

“You will understand once you’ve read the letter. This is part of one of the conditions.” John had read the letter, the only condition stated was that Alex wasn’t to be harmed after Smith agreed to the deal, but John decided to improvise and add on to that. He really needed to see Alex, to assess the damage done to him, to reassure him they hadn’t given up on him.

“Ah,” Smith said and nodded in understanding, but somehow he made the action feel condescending. “Then I would suggest we move this inside. Two birds with one stone.”

 _Two birds with._..? 

The man addressed the two soldiers to John’s sides. “Wait out here.”

“Yes, Sir!”

Smith turned and lifted the tent-flap, motioning for John to follow, so he ducked inside behind him.

He did a quick sweep of the room, but it seemed all the weapons in it were on Smith’s own person. It was similar to the general’s tent, with a cot and a desk, and-

“Alex,” he croaked and staggered to his knees beside him, the other man forgotten.

He was tied to a tent-pole by his wrists, but he sat with his knees drawn close to his chest and his body slumped forward over them–that had to do a number on his shoulders, that could not be comfortable at all, why would he sit like that?

And that was when John forced himself to really _look_. There was blood, a lot of it, too much. 

His arms were coated in it, in a dark crust that suggested the wounds weren’t fresh, but with spots of bright red on top; some had been ripped back open. Then his eyes caught on his back, hunched over as it was–his shirt was soaked, covered in dark blood, but it wasn’t his shirt, the shirt he wore now was too big on him, and _that was why he sat like that_ -

“Did you _whip_ him?” John said, horrified at the notion alone. He wanted nothing more than to reach out and hold Alex close, protect him and stroke the hair from his face and never let him go. To keep him safe and sound, far away from all this.

“I believe you have a letter for me,” Smith said. John whirled around and glared, shoved a hand into his pocket and held the parchment out for that disgusting man to take. As soon as he had, he turned back to Alex and shuffled closer to him.

He couldn’t do anything for him, he realised with a sinking feeling in his stomach. There was nothing he could do. Alex was passed out, he had lost a lot of blood, and it seemed the only attention his wounds had received was the old shirt pulled over them.

“He wants us to take him and let the boy go?” Smith said somewhere behind him, the amusement clear in his voice. “Isn’t that just so sweet. You hear that, Alex? Daddy wants to die for you.”

John’s eyes narrowed and he bit his tongue hard so he didn’t accidentally blurt something out that would get him killed.

God, _that man_. He had been in his presence for not five minutes and was already too close to losing control over himself, he couldn’t imagine how Alex must have felt these past three days.

Alex. John moved closer still and raised a hand to Alexander’s face, buried against his knees; he wanted to touch, wanted to somehow communicate he was there, but he didn’t know how badly he was hurt, if there was something he couldn’t see.

“Alex,” he murmured and settled on laying his hand down on top of his matted hair, the touch as light as he could manage; still, it got him a reaction. A startled one, as Alex jolted and snapped his head up, but a reaction nonetheless.

John pulled his hand back and raised them both in front of himself, waiting for the spark of recognition in those frightened, dull eyes. His heart clenched at the pitiable sight in front of him–his Alexander was full of fire, opinionated, loud, and didn’t back down no matter what; he was a force of nature. This, well.

He looked so small, so fragile and scared, and _hurt_. He seemed out of it, slow on the uptake and too soft around the edges like he did when he was sick. And the man who had done that to him was still in the room with them. 

John would kill him, he would look right into those horrible, cruel, smug eyes and pull the trigger, and he would enjoy watching the light fade from them.

Alex focused on him, and the instant he did, his face crumpled into a sob that stabbed right through John’s chest. 

“John, you shouldn’t- you need to- you were _safe_ ,” he stammered out in between heart-wrenching cries. John’s hands itched to touch him, to work through those tangled locks, to stroke up and down his arm and soothe him.

Alex’s outburst seemed to get Smith’s attention, as he came to stand beside them, looked down at them with cool amusement.

“Is that the John you’ve been mumbling about? The one who was with you when we made our little deal? I should have known,” he mused. “I should have taken you too, maybe our Alex would have been a little more forthcoming with your life on the line.”

Alex didn’t react to anything he said, but John could barely contain himself. _Our Alex_? He thought the fuck not.

John got back to his feet and placed himself between Smith and Alex, blocking the man’s view of him entirely. “He needs those wounds treated, right now,” he said, glaring so hard his forehead began to hurt.

Smith raised an eyebrow. “So? He’s alive and awake, he’ll be just fine.”

The edges of John’s vision took on a red tint. “You will have him treated, _right now_. The general didn’t just send me here to bring you a letter, I’m here to make sure Alexander is in a condition for that deal to happen. And let me tell you, I’m not very impressed right now.” He paused and clenched his teeth. All of this, everything he said from this point on, was a bluff. John knew he had no power, no advantage to use, but Alex needed help–in the state he was in, he realised, sick to his stomach, he couldn’t get him out. Even if he had had a plan how to manage that, Alex was dead weight at the moment, hurt and terrified and not thinking straight.

Alex still sobbed quietly behind him, and it might have been the hardest thing he did in his life to not turn around to check on him at that moment.

“Do you think General Washington will agree to this if his son is at death’s doorstep already? Just have him treated,” he said. Smith’s expression changed a bit, but not in a significant way that made him any easier to read. 

“Will you shut up if I agree?” he said after a long moment.

John narrowed his eyes, the unbridled rage pushing thick through his veins, like molten rock. He took a deep breath. “ _Yes,_ ” he hissed out. 

Smith smiled–it had something animalistic, and it made John feel like the lamb before the slaughter. His stomach turned as he imagined him regarding Alexander with that twisted look.

“Before we do that, though,” he said and stepped around John, stopped right in front of Alex, and John watched warily. “Would you like to try our little game from this morning again, Alex? Perhaps with some added stakes?”

John stood by and blinked in confusion, looked down to Alex to see if he could make anything of his reaction–and when he looked back up, he stared straight down the barrel of a gun. His thoughts froze, and he didn’t know how to react. His soldier’s instincts screamed at him to grab for the gun, duck out of the way and wrench it from him, to put a quick bullet between his eyes and be done with it, but he stamped that out.

He couldn’t, not with Alex right there and two enemy soldiers just past the tent-flaps.

So, he didn’t do anything, just glanced back at Alex when he heard his breath hitch.

“Don’t,” he sobbed and tugged at his bonds in a way that made John’s shoulders ache just by watching it. “Please don’t hurt him.”

He stared up at Smith with tears streaming down his sweaty, pale face, eyes pleading and dim, and bit down on his already split lip. 

This was bad, this was very bad. John should have known Smith would try something like this, but he hadn’t thought the man would know they were close enough to be used against each other- a thought smacked him upside the head. Smith had said Alex had mumbled about him, his name most likely. Alex only ever talked in his sleep when he had a fever.

Shit.

“The supply-lines, Alex. Do you think you can tell me the truth now? Or would you rather I put a bullet into your John’s head?”

“No, I- I can show you, don’t hurt him, I’ll tell you, just please-” 

The gun fell away and was holstered, and Smith bent down and cut the rope binding Alexander’s wrists, grabbed him by his hair and yanked him up from the ground. Alex cried out weakly and stumbled over to the table as Smith gave him a slight shove, and John was in the man’s face before he knew what he was doing.

“Don’t fucking treat him like that, you-” That was as far as he got before the gun was back in Smith’s hand and a cold pressure against his chest.

“Another word out of your mouth and Alex gets to watch you bleed out,” he said, his eyes boring into John’s, and John scowled–he could read the thoughts behind them. Smith wanted him to keep talking.

He peered past the man’s shoulder at Alex, who looked back at him with wide eyes and shook his head; it would have been funny, if the situation wasn’t so all around fucked. 

That was how it had all started, hadn’t it? A gun to Alex’s head and John shaking his own, telling him not to do anything stupid without saying the words.

He stayed silent, and eventually Smith lowered the gun, but didn’t put it away, and slapped a rolled up parchment he retrieved from a wooden trunk down on the table in front of Alex. Smith watched as Alex straightened it out and took up the quill, began drawing familiar lines into the map, the gun in one of his filthy hands, and the other tangled in Alexander’s hair, smoothing the strands that hung into his eyes away from his face. John’s blood boiled as he took note of all the aborted little movements Alex made, like he wanted to twist away but knew better than to try.

When he put the quill back down, a self-satisfied smirk had found its way onto Smith’s face, and his hand slipped down and came to rest on Alex’s nape. “There we go. You can be such a good boy, Alex, I don’t understand why you always have to be so difficult.”

Alex stared down into his lap, tears at the corners of his eyes as he opened the cut on his lip back up with his teeth. What he just did was technically treason–but Washington wouldn’t care, and neither did John.

“Well, I’m a man of my word. One of the gentlemen outside will get Alex to a medic, the other will escort you out of my damn camp,” Smith said, way too chipper, and John’s heart sank. He couldn’t leave Alex, not in the state he was in; and he couldn’t get him out. Not in the state he was in.

He should have thought this through to the end.

“Tell George I’m inclined to accept his proposition, if you would.” He gripped Alex by the arm and hauled him up and across the room, past John who could only watch his pained expression and pray the rough handling wasn’t making anything worse.

John followed them out as though in a daze. Smith handed Alex off to one of the soldiers and went back inside without another glance at him. The man started dragging Alex away, and he twisted back to look at John. John returned his gaze, tried to communicate to him that he wasn’t leaving him, wasn’t leaving without him.

The other soldier walked off in the opposite direction, and John stumbled after him, maintaining the eye-contact with Alex for as long as possible, but he disappeared behind another tent after just a few moments.

He ended up back where he had begun and mounted his horse, steered it out into the night and rode off until he was sure they couldn’t see him any longer, then dismounted again. 

He stood, a hand to the horse’s strong flank, and stared back at the lights of the camp. There had to be something he could do, something that wouldn’t let this whole endeavour have been for nothing, a way he could reach Alex and get him out.

John stood there and thought about it for a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry Mister Laurens but what the fuck do you think you're doing


	6. Day Three (Part Three)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alex hatches a plan in like two minutes, and somehow it's still better than whatever the fuck John is doing.  
> Mister Creepy McCreeperson continues to creep, congrats to him for keeping to his brand I guess.

Alex was well aware his brain wasn’t working right at the moment, there was far too little blood in his body for it to do so, and besides, he felt… warm. Flushed. Too slow.

He was coming down with something, had already come down with something, because his body loved to fail him at the most inopportune of moments, and it really wasn’t helping the matter.

Still, even through the haze of pain and blood-loss and what probably would mount up to a proper fever, he realised what had just happened had been... odd. To say the least. He might’ve been a little out of it, but that hadn’t seemed right, not at all.

What had John been doing there? Pa wouldn’t have sent John to deliver a letter, would he? John, who was way too close to this, who loved Alex more than he valued his own life, who was known to be impulsive and reckless even at the best of times. And all alone on top of that?

No. Alex liked to think he knew his father, and he knew that he would want John as far away from the situation as possible; but Alex knew John, too. He knew John would stop at nothing for him. 

This, walking into the enemy’s camp without backup to deliver a letter, a letter that was most likely fake, all things considered, and yelling in Smith’s face, making demands he knew he had no leverage to make–this did not bear his father’s touch. Pa would have never agreed to something so dangerous. This reeked of John’s very own brand of tomfoolery.

He was on a suicide-mission. All on his own and behind Pa’s back. 

That sweet, brash, hotheaded, _stupid_ moron who Alex was so in love with.

If they survived this, he would slap him into next week.

Alex winced as the medic scrubbed an alcohol-dampened rag along his newly cleaned arm, the disgusting, itchy crust gone at last, and cursed himself in the same breath. He wasn’t that weak, he could take a bit of a sting; it was just that the man wasn’t exactly working with care. Why would he? Alex was a prisoner, someone he probably didn’t want to waste any resources on.

He wrapped his arm up in stark white bandages and moved on to the other. Alex sighed a small breath of relief when he finished up with his arms–having them taken care of already made him feel better, even though he dreaded what was to come next.

“Down on your stomach, boy,” the doctor ordered and rotated his wrist at him, motioning for him to roll over.

Alex swallowed and shifted on the cot he sat on, twisted until he could lower himself down slowly. He buried his face in his arms as the medic began scraping away at his open back, or as the man might call it, 'cleaning it'.

His thoughts drifted as he lay there, squirming away from the sharp stabs of pain and whimpering like a child, and found their way back to John before long.

The look he had given him as Alex was being dragged away, he had seen that before; he knew what it meant. _Do or die_ and _all or nothing_ came to mind, and he knew, fuck, _he knew_ John was about to do something incredibly, astoundingly stupid.

He would get himself killed, that was what would happen, nothing good could come of this, with John all on his own and most likely without a real plan.

Alex had to do something, he needed to meet him in the middle and hope they would make it out together–or John would end up dead, and so would Alex when Smith realised he had been deceived.

He had to find a way out. After his wounds had been sufficiently poked around in, they would drag him back to Smith, and he would tie him back to that godforsaken post, or the chair if he wanted to make the night extra uncomfortable for him; he knew he wouldn’t be able to slip out of those bonds, he had _tried_ , but the rope was thick and Smith pulled it tight, there was no way.

Alex would have to cut it.

He turned his head to the side and looked around the well-lit tent, gaze drifting slowly, without raising suspicion. Not that the doctor watched what he was doing, anyway, the man was busy spreading what felt like acid along the length of his back. Alex swallowed the little sounds of displeasure that spilled from his throat and focused through the pain.

This shouldn’t be too hard, he was in a medic’s tent. There were sharp objects all around, he just had to get his hands on one and hide it on his body until he needed it–well. Perhaps he was being a bit too optimistic. That was not as easy as Alex tried to make it out to be to himself.

The small table a few feet from the cot he was on held a collection of scalpels in differing sizes, and he would be able to reach it when he got back up without moving off far enough to seem suspicious.

God, if Smith found a blade on him- no. He wouldn’t go down that route, he needed to keep his head as clear as possible, which was already easier said than done, the overall state of him considered. 

The doctor moved away and across his field of vision, and the splashing of water reached his ears. He was washing his hands. They were done.

“Put the shirt back on, I’m not dressing those. Can’t waste that many bandages,” he said, his back turned to him, and walked off farther into the tent.

Alex stared and stayed still for a moment until he was sure the man was distracted enough by whatever he had set out to do, and lifted himself back into a sitting position, gradually and with clenched teeth. His back strained with every little movement, but he pushed the nagging ache aside.

He got to his feet and took small, careful steps over to the table, not making a sound as he went, eyes glued to the point the doctor had disappeared from view from. It seemed too convenient. Why would the man just leave him alone? A prisoner, around a multitude of deadly instruments? If he had wanted to, he could have taken one of those and put an end to himself, and then they wouldn’t have gained a damn thing from this whole endeavour–well, Alex thought with a bitter taste on his tongue, except the supply-routes he had given up less than half an hour ago.

Damn John and his stupid, harebrained half-idea of a rescue plan and his stupid, beautiful eyes in that stupid, freckled face that made Alex’s brain shut off even when there wasn’t a loaded gun pointed at him.

God, he would _so_ slap that idiot of a man.

Alex glanced down at the table only for a split-second before his eyes found their fixed point again. The scalpels were sorted by size, so he snatched the very first one, the smallest, with a blade barely longer than the pad of his thumb; he had to hope the doctor wouldn’t notice it missing, as it didn’t leave an obvious gap in the row.

He backtracked back to the cot and cut a small piece of fabric from the bandages the medic had left, wrapped it around the blade and shoved the scalpel into the back of his breeches. That would have to do.

Footfalls sounded from the direction he had last seen the doctor, and Alex hastened to pull the disgusting, bloody shirt back over his head, biting his tongue to keep from crying out as his back strained against his every move.

When the man came back into view, Alex looked up at him as though he didn’t know what to do with himself, eyes wide and probably glassy from the onset of sickness.

The doctor frowned. “Are you still here? What else do you want?”

Alex blinked at him, confused and innocent. “Was I supposed to leave on my own, Sir?”

His frown deepened. He stalked past him and slapped the tent-flap aside, looked around until he found the man who had presented him with Alex in the first place. 

“Quit your daydreaming and come take the fucking boy, I have better things to do than babysit the general’s little toy-prisoner,” he called, and the soldier brushed past him and came straight up to Alex. He pressed his mouth into a thin line and held his tongue, even as the man gripped him by his upper arm and hoisted him from the cot.

Was that what they thought he was? Smith’s toy? Well, he couldn’t fault them, as Smith seemed to be under that impression as well.

The soldier didn’t look at him once as he dragged him back the way they’d come from, not as Alex stumbled due to his fast pace, nor when he cried out because the man made too sharp of a turn and it jostled the welts on his back. His lower back tingled where the warm metal of the scalpel shifted on his skin with every step, and he hoped the flimsy makeshift cover he had made for the blade would hold.

That cursed tent came into view once more, the soldier knocked on the tent-pole and Smith appeared in the opening, a predatory glint in his too bright eyes; Alex swallowed and looked at the ground beneath his feet rather than at that infuriating grin. He was handed from one man to the other like a piece of luggage, a dog on a leash, but he couldn’t do anything. Not yet. Still, the humiliation burned hot in his cheeks–or maybe it was the fever. Perhaps both.

Smith didn’t say anything as he forced him down to the ground to tie him back up, just smirked at the hiss of pain that slipped past Alex’s lips as his back arched at the impact with the floor.

He squirmed a bit as Smith got himself situated on the chair; to him, it would look like Alex shifted to get more comfortable, but he really attempted to get a feel for the hidden scalpel. With the position he was in, it would be easy to reach, it was just the actual act of cutting that worried him–he couldn’t see what he was doing, after all. He would be fumbling in the dark, behind his back, a blade just a second and a wrong move away from some of his most valuable assets.

It would take nothing short of a miracle for him to come out of this alive and with all his fingers still attached.

“So,” Smith said, all sharp smiles and piercing stares. “Lieutenant Colonel John Laurens. It’s rather curious, don’t you think? To call out another man’s name in one’s sleep?”

“I don’t see anything curious about it,” Alex said and crossed his legs, leaned forward, away from the pole in his back. He felt too warm, but the beginnings of a tremor shook his bent knees.

“I don’t suppose you would,” he answered with a grin. Fuck. He’d said the wrong thing, but his brain wasn’t working fast enough to keep up with the man at this time. “Well, I have to admit, he’s a handsome boy. If it’s boys you like. I think you would fare better with a real man, Alex, someone who knows how to keep you tame and satisfied.”

Alex scowled and averted his gaze, heat rising in his cheeks, up to his ears. It was the illness, he told himself.

“Oh?” Smith said, bemused. “Nothing to say for yourself?” He paused, but Alex kept his silence. He still wouldn’t look back at the man, but he knew he was watching him, could feel the weight of his gaze on him, searching for even the most miniscule of reactions. 

“I wonder, though… Does your father know of your attachment to this young man? Maybe I ought to let him know when I put the gun to his head. Perhaps I ought to write it down, send it to his successor. What do you think they would do to you and Lieutenant Laurens without daddy there to protect you?”

Alex squeezed his eyes shut, his brow furrowed. Cold sweat stood on his forehead, and his mouth felt like it was filled with sand. He was surprised and mildly concerned to note that the threat didn’t have any effect on him; he should be repelled by the concept alone.

“It’s not like that,” he said.

Smith chuckled. It sounded pitying, as though he thought Alex delusional, but wanted to humour him instead of dragging him back to cold, hard reality, kicking and screaming.

“No, of course not. Close friendships between men aren't unusual in times of war such as these. He must be a very good friend, for him to threaten me on your behalf when he has to know I could have him shot with the snap of my fingers. That’s a normal thing people do for their friends every day.” The sarcasm was so casual, Alex had trouble detecting it with his muddled senses, but he pretended he hadn’t actually picked up in it.

“He _is_ a good friend,” he said, and didn’t elaborate. He wouldn’t give Smith any more information to pounce onto, he just had to give answers so the man wouldn’t have a reason to hit him again–knowing his luck, he would rip something back open as he was slapped around.

Smith hummed. His eyes didn’t leave him, he could feel them burning hot on his body, but Alex refused to return the gaze.

“I bet he is.” A beat of silence. “Do you let him fuck you?”

Alex whipped his head around so hard he pinched something in his neck. He flushed down to his chest, from anger and embarrassment alike, and clenched his jaw as he glared up at Smith, the tip of his tongue caught between his front teeth as to not start cussing the man out; the fuzziness faded from his sight, lifted from his ears, the cotton-like quality of his thoughts cleared for a moment, and everything was bright and sharp once again. His skin was too hot–he felt he might burst into flames any second with the inferno of rage going strong inside him.

“ _Excuse me_?” he hissed. How _dare he_? He had no right to his life, his love, his bed, no right to ask him something so personal and invasive, to attempt to taint something so delicate, to drag it into the light for everyone to see and ruin it. He wouldn’t let him, he could have his dignity and pride, his humanity, but Alex wouldn’t let him have _this_.

“You heard me,” he responded, the corners of his mouth turned up in a smug grimace of a smile, his body-language as relaxed as he had ever seen it. He was at ease, he enjoyed making Alex uncomfortable–not that that was any news to him.

“What you suggest is unlawful and punishable by death, and I resent the implication. John is a good man,” he said. His eyes were narrowed, and his voice carried his fury in a subtle growl he had never heard himself make before.

“Oh, Alex,” he said, and there was a new spike of hatred in him at how casually that nickname rolled off his tongue. “You are so obvious. It’s quite telling that you immediately jump to defend your John’s honour and leave your own person out of the conversation.”

Alex seethed in silence and stared Smith right into his soulless eyes, willing him to back down–but he didn’t, he just had to have the last word, had to keep pushing until he broke.

He stood from the chair and came to kneel in front of Alex, but he couldn’t kick at him, as his legs were folded into each other. Maybe he wouldn’t even have kicked him if they weren’t. Alex was tired, and he hurt.

“I might just write that letter, send it off to your camp. Tell everyone about the great General Washington’s little bastard boy, made chief aide through nepotism, and imagine, he’s a sodomite on top of that. George would be dead, and he would have died for nothing–because they would hang you. Your own people would kill you for me, isn’t that right? That would be a nice ending to this little exploit.” 

Alex swallowed. Tears of rage and hopelessness pricked at the corners of his eyes, but he blinked until his sight was clear once more. His chest was tight and his breathing heavy. He didn’t think he had ever hated a person with the same ferocity as he despised that man, hadn't even thought it possible to be this consumed by contempt.

Smith smiled and raised a hand to his face–Alex flinched away on instinct. Smith’s eyes danced with delight at the reaction, and he cursed himself.

The hand came to rest on his cheek. Alex turned his head away from the unwelcome touch, but Smith just hooked his fingers underneath his jaw and forced his head back straight. 

“You feel a little warm, Alex,” he said, voice quiet and devoid of the mocking tone he always spoke with; or Alex was just too feverish to tell the difference. “A night’s rest will do you good.”

Smith leaned into him, into his space, way too close, until he was in his face, but he didn’t stop there. He came closer until Alex felt his breath on his skin, his hairs standing on end, and he fought against his body’s impulse to back away. He couldn’t do that, he couldn’t put his flayed back against the pole behind him. 

His eyes screwed shut and he ducked his head, but it was no use; Smith’s presence, his closeness, was like a thick smoke, all-encompassing and smothering. Dry, chapped lips were pressed to his cheek.

Alex’s face twisted in disgust and a sudden wave of nausea swept over him, his stomach laying itself into knots; Smith didn’t back off after that, his lips moved to his ear instead, and Alex began to tremble. Bursts of colour exploded behind his closed lids with how tightly he squeezed them shut.

“Good night, sweetheart,” he whispered. The next moment, the repulsive heat around him was gone, the smoke cleared, and Smith was halfway to his cot, leaving Alex to catch his breath and calm his upset stomach on his own.

That might have been worse than the whipping, Alex thought, as he tried to steady his shaking limbs.


	7. Day Four (Part One)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters? In one day? In this economy?  
> What can I say, I'm just excited about this one :)

The minutes crept by at a torturous pace.

Alex sat in the dark and listened to Smith’s breathing, waited for it to even out and for it to stay that way, his heart hammering in his chest all the while.

His head pounded, mouth too dry, and sweat dripped into his eyes–he couldn’t deny it, couldn’t push it away any longer: He was sick.

Alex was sick, and his hands shook in their bonds, and he couldn’t concentrate enough to still them, and- Smith had been asleep for what felt like hours, but what had most likely not even been a full sixty minutes.

He had to act now, set his plan into motion before John fucking Laurens, who was the love of his life, unfortunately, got another brilliant idea and subsequently got himself murdered.

Alex shifted his weight forward and shuffled nearer to the post his hands were tied behind, mindful to not let his back come into contact with the wood, and turned his wrists until his fingers could reach the scalpel hidden on his lower back.

As his fingers closed around the handle and pulled, the fabric he had wrapped it with slipped off, and he jolted and bit his lip to stifle a yelp as the blade dug into the tender skin beneath the waistband of his breeches.

He breathed carefully, deep and even, and pulled it the rest of the way out. His hands still trembled; one clasped around the warm metal, the other bend as far in the direction away from it as the rope would allow.

Christ, he was going to cut himself up.

Alex shoved at that thought, but it wouldn’t quite leave him as he tightened his grip on the scalpel and felt for the part of the rope easiest to sever with the angle he had. He adjusted the blade slightly and went for it–the scalpel slipped on the rope and didn’t cut, as far as he could tell. Shit.

The fingers of his other hand curled around the rope and held it taut, and he tried again. He felt a small resistance and a slackening of part of the rope he held onto, heard a barely detectable sound of something under tension being cut into. The angle was right, then, he just had to keep going. It was a thick rope, after all.

He sawed away at the bonds and kept his body as motionless as he was able, counted with his breathing to be sure it didn’t quicken–he couldn’t risk waking Smith up with an out of place noise.

After several minutes of working the too small blade through the rope, the cot creaked; Smith had shifted. Alex stopped everything he was doing at once, even breathing, and sat in the silent darkness, waiting.

Nothing else happened. The man’s breathing was still regular. He hadn’t woken.

Alex bit back the sigh of relief and got to work again. He fit the scalpel back into the notch he had already carved out and applied pressure- too quickly, not careful enough. The blade slipped and nicked into the delicate skin between his thumb and his forefinger, but his grip wasn’t good enough to stop it there, and it cut farther down, went into the soft spot of his palm.

Alex pressed his chin to his chest and closed his eyes, a lone tear travelled down his cheek, and bit at his lips hard to keep from making a sound. Warm blood gushed from his hand and dampened the rope in its hold, and he removed the blade from his split skin with deliberately calculated movements.

It hurt like a bitch, but he had to keep going. 

He pressed the scalpel to the notch anew, slower and with more care this time, and continued to cut at the material with small movements of his wrist. His hands shook all the harder for the pain, but he was almost there, almost, he had to keep going for just a little longer, and-

The rope gave and fell from his wrists, dropped to the ground with a soft thud that resounded too loud in Alex’s ears.

He sat there, stunned, scalpel clutched in one hand, the other bleeding around a piece of slack rope he hadn’t let go of yet. It _worked_. He hadn’t actually expected to get that far.

Alex lowered the blade and the rope to the ground slowly and stretched his legs out in front of himself, pulled them back to his chest and began the gradual process of standing up. He clawed at the pole and heaved himself up, quietly and with shaking knees; it pulled at the welts on his back, the cuts on his arms, the one on his hand, but he ignored the pain.

As soon as he made it to an upright position, he took the first clumsy step over to the other side of the tent.

Sure, he could slip out into the night and hope to be far away when Smith woke, but that entailed too many risks. Smith could wake by the sound of the tent-flaps being undone, or the slight breeze that would waft in, and then Alex would be done for.

No, he needed to end it right there.

Thank God he had always been kind of small, loath as he was to admit it, so he was light on his feet, even when he was feverish and on the verge of collapsing.

He could do this, goddamnit, he would do this, he would walk away from this alive and drag John’s stupid ass back to Pa where he was safe–well, where John _would_ be safe if Alex wasn’t certain he had gone behind his father’s back in doing this.

Alex snuck past the desk and came to a halt less than three feet from the cot. Smith was still asleep, and he sent a quick prayer to whoever might be listening for it to stay that way. His knees almost buckled as he lowered himself into a crouching position, but he steadied himself with his hands on the ground, even as a biting pain shot through his palm.

When he thought himself stable enough, he began to swipe his hands along the ground, eyes open but not a great help in locating what he was looking for–the moon was full, but the night cloudy, so the light that penetrated the canvas of the tent was little. He could only make out vague outlines, and that didn’t help him with this.

His hands slid through fabric and pushed it aside; Smith’s clothes. He always dropped them to the ground when he undressed, and with them-

The tips of his fingers grazed leather, and he knew he had hit his mark. He followed the length of the belt until he brushed the cool, leather-wrapped handle of that cursed dagger that had been at his throat, that had cut into his skin and tasted his blood.

He drew it from the sheath slowly, mindful to not make a sound, and grasped it tightly in both hands as he struggled back to his feet.

By the time he loomed over Smith’s dark, still form, the handle was slippery with his blood, but he just clung harder. He stood there and stared for almost a full minute, for good reason; he only had a single shot. Alex couldn’t screw this up. So, he kept looking until he could make out the line of Smith’s jaw, the curve of his neck. He lay on his side, facing him.

Alex knew his breathing was too shallow, and that it wasn’t helping how light-headed he felt, and that it wouldn’t calm the tremors wrecking his body, but he was too afraid of Smith hearing him if he dared take a deeper breath.

He pressed his lips into a thin line, drew in a sharp, distinct breath, aimed for the spot between his jaw and his adam’s apple, and stabbed the dagger straight through Smith’s neck.

The man’s eyes snapped open and a wet gurgling sound tore from his throat. Alex pulled the dagger out, watched the blood spurt and Smith’s eyes, bright in the darkness, focus on him, spark with recognition, before he jammed the blade back down just beneath the first stab, pulled it back out.

The sound it made, a sort of wet squelching, turned his stomach. Smith attempted to speak, or at least Alex thought so, but nothing but choked, sodden noises came out.

Alex panted for air, no longer caring if the breaths he gulped in were too loud.

Smith’s hand came up to clutch at the wounds in his neck, but there was nothing he could do–the inky dark blood spilled past his fingers in abundance, stained the sheets underneath him, and Alex watched with wide eyes. The dagger slipped from his limp fingers, slick with his own blood and Smith’s, and he dropped to the ground with it as his knees gave out.

He sat there for however long it took for a man to bleed to death, slow and in agony, eyes locked with Alex’s as the light drained from them like the blood from his body.

Smith ceased moving, breathing, but the blood kept dripping.

Alex trembled where he knelt, breath loud and hitching, chest heaving with dry sobs–the metallic stench of too much blood hit him suddenly, and he doubled over and threw up bile, his stomach in cramps.

Smith had not been the first man he’d killed, but the only death by Alex’s hands that hadn’t happened on a battle-field, the first man he had stabbed in the neck and watched bleed out.

He needed to leave, he needed to go right now, he couldn’t, he had to-

He sorted through the clothes next to him on the floor until he found the largest piece of fabric–Smith’s coat, his red coat, and Alex stumbled back to his feet and slipped it on without pausing to let himself think about it.

If he wanted to make it through this camp undetected, he had to blend in. It didn’t matter that the coat was too big on him, that the cuffs reached down to his fingers, it just mattered that it was red and that it was on Alex.

He fumbled for the dagger and pushed it into the coat-pocket, the blade cutting through the inside easily, but Alex didn’t care–he yanked at the fastenings of the tent-flaps and shoved them aside, staggered out into the cloudy night without taking another look at the cooling body he left in his wake.

* * *

John had stood at his vantage-point with his horse for too long–long enough that he eventually just sat down on the grass and pulled his knees to his chest as he tried to figure out a way to reach Alex.

The moon was high in the sky, but clouds covered it more often than not. He had watched it move across the firmament, so he knew he must have sat there for far more than an hour before he made his final decision.

He had waited long enough. Long enough he could have conceivably ridden back to camp _and_ returned in that timespan.

It wasn’t like he had too many options, so he decided to go with it–go back to the enemy’s camp, tell them the general had sent him back to negotiate a time and place for the exchange. They would believe that, they had to, right?

John mounted his horse and steered it back towards the camp; the lights had lessened in the time he had spent. Most of the soldiers would be asleep.

He repeated the same old spiel, got off the horse a good distance away and walked the rest, raised a hand when he came close enough. This time, though, there weren’t even close to ten men waiting for him–there was a single man at the gates who watched him with suspicion. They let a lone soldier guard a gate? How hadn’t the colonies won this war yet?

“I’m Lieutenant Colonel John Laurens, I’m here to negotiate,” he said.

“Negotiate?” the soldier said, perplexed. He couldn’t have been older than John himself. “About what?”

“The deal concerning Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Hamilton.”

The man blinked at him and put his shoulder against the wooden palisade; he was relaxed, at ease. That was probably a good thing.

“It’s past midnight, mate. I doubt you will find anyone who will want to negotiate with you at this hour.”

John clenched his jaw and flexed his fingers at his sides. He knew that, of course he did, but he needed to _get in_.

“I’m aware of the late hour, it’s just that this is urgent business for General Washington-” He broke off when the soldier turned away from him and stared back over his shoulder–a second later, John heard it too. Footsteps, drawing nearer.

“Oh, hey,” the soldier said. “Are you the relief? Because I’m dead on my feet and there’s some continental soldier here-”

That was as far as he got. John saw a flash of red, the wet glint of metal in the silver moonlight, and the soldier collapsed, the noise of blood bubbling up his throat stark against the silence of the night.

He took two quick steps back when the figure stepped around the prone body, out of the shadows cast by the palisade and into the dim light–and rushed forward when he caught the first glimpse of the man’s face.

“Dear God, Alex-”

“We need to go,” he said as he stumbled up to John, unsteady on his feet and hands shaking and covered in blood under those red coat-sleeves.

Alex swayed where he stood, his eyes far away and wet with fever, and John glanced at the dead soldier, past the palisade into the quiet camp, and back at his Alexander, who- God, he had gotten out all on his own, he had made it out of that tent, out of the camp, even, all by himself.

“John,” he said, his voice urgent but distant, as if he knew he had to do something right that instant but couldn’t quite remember what it was. “We have to, we need-”

His eyes rolled back into his head and his body went slack, and John lurched forward and caught him before he could hit the ground, scooped him up into his arms, trying and failing to leave the pressure off his back.

Shit. Shit, fuck, goddamnit all, Alex needed help, he needed rest, he needed a proper meal–what he didn’t need was half an hour at least on horseback.

John cursed under his breath and pulled Alex closer to his body, maneuvered his limp form up and over the saddle as the horse scratched its hooves over the dry ground nervously. He climbed up himself and pulled Alex up into a sitting position, wrapped his arms around him so he wouldn’t be jostled around too much, and spurred the horse into a gallop.

His grip tightened on Alex as they sped away into the night, the reins clutched in just one hand, and he breathed in deeply. Fuck, he smelled unwashed, metallic, like old blood, and there was something foreign about him, the coat, probably, but there was still _Alex_ underneath it all, and John had missed that scent so much.

His sight blurred, and when he blinked, that wetness spilled over, rolled down his cheeks and to Alex’s shoulder, into his hair.

Alex was alive, his chest rising and falling with precious breath, his body a warm weight against John’s, and despite the state he was in, the illness, the hurt, the exhaustion, John couldn’t help but cry tears of relief the entire way back to camp.

They had him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone got what they deserved :)


	8. Day Four (Part Two)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My upload schedule do be kinda wack, huh.  
> WELL I'm back with this humble offering.  
> People yell at John because he's an idiot and Alex gets his wounds looked at by someone who doesn't want him dead :)

John didn’t slow the horse when the entrance to camp came into view, he just curled his fingers tighter around the reins and pressed Alex closer to his chest as the men standing guard yelled at him to stop and dismount.

No way in hell he would stop now.

He rode hard through camp and pulled the reins taut, forcing the horse to a sudden stop in front of the medic’s tent.

The man burst out, either woken up or just alarmed by the commotion, and glared up at John with furrowed brows. 

“What on earth do you think-”

“It’s Alex. Hamilton. Alexander Hamilton. He needs help, right now,” John said, distracted, as he shifted Alex’s prone form in his arms and tried to come up with a way to get him off the horse unharmed.

The solution to that problem presented itself in the form of a yelling french-man. The first thing he heard was a string of what were without a doubt expletives in that same language, and then much of the same in english.

“What the fuck, Laurens? What the _fuck_! I cannot believe you would be so-” Lafayette stalked up to him with tense shoulders and balled fists, the murder in his eyes clearly visible even in the mellow moonlight, and came to a stop in front of his horse. His screaming died down as his narrowed eyes caught on Alex, mouth open in shock. John blinked down at him. Lafayette blinked back.

“Is that- Mon dieu, it is,” he said, gobsmacked.

“He’s hurt. Help me get him down?”

Laf shook his head and snapped out of his stupor, stepped closer with a mumble of affirmation, and reached his arms up. John shifted Alex once again, hissing in a sharp breath every time he had to put his arms around his back–he prayed the breakneck-speed ride back to camp hadn’t made anything worse, but the wounds were fresh and he knew at least a couple had to have opened back up.

Together they managed to get Alex down safely, John jumped off after him, and helped Laf carry him into the tent past the disgruntled medic.

“Wait,” he said as Laf made to lower Alex down onto a cot. “Not like that. On his stomach. His back- well.”

He could watch the realisation dawn on the other man’s face, and a second later the murderous expression from before was back, this time not directed at John, thankfully.

Lafayette mumbled to himself in what sounded to John like very pissed off french as they shuffled around a bit and managed to get Alex situated on his stomach.

“Great,” the medic spoke up, shoved past both John and Lafayette, and dropped down to a stool next to the cot. “Now, if you would be so kind as to get the fuck out so I can examine the patient?”

A protest lay ready on John’s tongue before the man had even finished his sentence, but just as he opened his mouth, a firm hand came down on his shoulder and forced him backwards.

“Of course,” Laf said, and bodily removed them both from the tent.

“Laf-” John began with a growl, but his friend wouldn’t have it.

“I don’t want to hear it, John,” he said and crossed his arms in front of himself. The look he gave him reminded John uncomfortably of the one his mother used to get whenever she scolded him.

“You are a fucking idiot. Do you even know what you did? You risked your life, you risked Alexander’s life, you went against direct orders, for fuck’s sake! The general is furious!”

Yeah, he would be. John would take any punishment without complaint–he knew he had screwed up, knew what he had done was a massive breach of the general’s trust and could be argued to be desertion, even if it was only for a few hours.

“How bad is it?” he asked, even though he didn’t want to hear the answer.

“How _bad_? I haven’t seen him this angry since Monmouth, he was yelling, he was _cursing_ , he punched a desk so hard it cracked!” Laf recounted with haunted eyes, and a shiver went down John’s spine. Monmouth had been horrendous; it had been the first and last time most of the aides had heard George Washington swear, had seen his iron control crack and shatter.

“And then… silence. Not a word from him. We’ve been too scared to go see what he’s doing, we’ve just been avoiding him for an hour now.”

“Christ,” John said and let out a shaky breath. “Does he know I’m back?”

Laf snorted. “No. I doubt anyone who saw you barrel in here like a bat out of hell wants to go tell the general. He might just shoot the messenger.”

John paused, and he knew his expression betrayed the trepidation that spread from his chest through his whole body, to the tips of his fingers. It almost pained him to say, “I should probably go see him.”

“Probably,” Laf agreed.

He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, tingling with anxiety, and pulled a distressed grimace before he got himself together again. “Could you- I mean, would you stay here? In case something happens? I wouldn’t want Alex to wake up all alone with a stranger.”

Lafayette’s sharp features softened. “Of course, mon ami.” He came closer and stepped into John’s space with natural ease, as though he did it every day, and put his hands to his cheeks, bent down a little so he could look him straight into the eyes. “I loved you like a brother. It was nice knowing you.”

John snarled and slapped his hands away, turned and walked off without another look back. “Hilarious, Laf. You’re hilarious.”

The walk to the general’s private tent was too short. 

His heartbeat was fast and his palms clammy when it came into view, and he swallowed around the lump that had already formed in his throat. The thoughts tearing around his head slowed, became unclear and muddled like a disturbed pond.

Of course Washington would be furious. John had known he would be from the moment he had started considering that course of action–and yet, the dread that seemed to have settled deep in his bones made it more and more difficult to keep walking.

It would be fine, he told himself. They had Alex back, that was all that mattered, and the rest would figure itself out.

He took a deep breath and let it out through his teeth as he stood just outside the tent-flaps and raised his hand to knock. 

“Sir, it’s me,” he said. His voice was level, but his hand shook as he lowered it back down to his side.

There was no answer, but that wasn’t unusual; he entered anyway.

The oil-lamp on the desk was bright, and the room well lit–that made it all the easier to read the emotions that flickered over the general’s face as he rose from his chair.

There was anger. A lot of it, an overwhelming amount, his eyes cold and hard as they found John’s, a vein pulsing on his forehead, jaw clenched hard enough the tendons in his neck became visible, and his chest heaving with carefully controlled breaths.

There was also something else, something he couldn’t put a name to. It bore similarity to sadness, to relief, but it was only there for a split-second, vanished quick enough for John to wonder if he had imagined it.

John took a deep breath and forced himself to hold the eye-contact. “Sir-”

Washington was across the few feet separating them in the blink of an eye.

John stumbled with the force of the blow to his cheek as sharp and sudden pain erupted over the side of his face. Tears shot to his eyes, but he willed them away and righted himself slowly, looked back at Washington with his back straight and shoulders squared. He could feel the man’s handprint red and hot on his cheek–he had probably deserved that.

He swallowed; his tongue was heavy and lame. The words wouldn’t come. “Sir-” he began anew.

A second slap landed hard over the first one, and John gasped as little white stars burst behind his eyelids. He pried his eyes back open and met the general’s intense glare once again.

“You go through my personal documents,” he finally pressed out. John flinched, but hearing him speak, even if it was with a voice shaking with anger and something else he couldn’t place, was better than his unbearable silence. 

“You leave camp without permission and under false pretences.” John averted his gaze, guilt gnawing at his ribcage. He really hoped the kid hadn’t gotten in trouble because of him.

“You enter the enemy’s camp, without backup or a real plan, _alone_ , against my explicit orders, on a suicide mission. And for what? What have you achieved? It’s a miracle you are even alive, John!”

Washington’s furious facade cracked as he screamed in John’s face, small pieces crumbling loose to reveal layers upon layers of grief and exhaustion, of worry; the marks of sleepless night after sleepless night stacked on top of each other became more evident on his face by the second.

John closed his eyes, knowing what he was about to say would get him smacked again. “I don’t regret it, Sir.”

The third slap echoed around the tent. John had been prepared, so he didn’t stumble, but still his eyes burned with the same intensity as his cheek did, as the shame behind his sternum did. It was true that he didn’t regret it, not when his half-baked plan had helped to get Alexander back, but he felt… bad. He had not only betrayed his superior, his commander in chief, but he had also disappointed, and in doing so deeply hurt, the father of the man he loved, someone who was by all means almost family.

“Do you think this is what Alex would want you to do? Do you think he would want you to disregard your own safety like this, to throw everything away the both of you worked for?”

That got John’s attention. _You were safe_ , Alex had sobbed earlier that night; it had been perhaps two hours since then, but the memory felt years away.

“No, Sir. But I still did it,” he said. 

Washington just stared at him for several uncomfortably long moments, then he dropped his gaze and brought a hand to his face, rubbed over his tense brow, almost absent-minded.

“You idiot boy. You stupid moron, you _fucking idiot_.”

“I know I was reckless, Sir,” he paused at the undignified snort the general let out. “But we made it back in the end.”

The hand dropped and his eyes snapped back up to John’s; the careful fledgling of hope in them made his throat constrict. 

“‘We’?”

A small smile crept onto his face despite his sore cheek and the nagging worry and guilt in his chest. "We got him back, Sir. It's over."

Washington closed his eyes and swayed on the spot, grabbed for the table to steady himself and sunk against it.

"Where?" he asked, voice thin and quiet, stifled by emotion.

"I'll show you."

The walk back to the medic’s tent somehow seemed longer than the one to the general’s had.

Lafayette was where he had left him, and he stood at attention when he spotted the general, even though the man himself didn’t appear to take any notice of it.

“Sir!” he said. “The doctor is finishing up, it should just be a few more minutes-”

The tent-flap opened, a sliver of warm light hit the dirt, and the medic came out. “Save your breath, I’m done.” His eyes flickered from Lafayette to John and settled on the general–he had apparently decided to ignore them in favour of focusing on Washington.

“There wasn’t much to treat. Most wounds had already been taken care of, even though I redid the welts on his back properly–a few had opened back up, courtesy of Mister Laurens over there riding like a madman.”

John glared, but the man kept ignoring him. He’d like to see how he would ride away from an enemy camp with an escaped prisoner of theirs; _slow_ hadn’t really been an option.

“There was a lot of blood.”

Washington stiffened next to him, but his expression didn’t change. 

“Not his. He bled some, I believe, but not that much.”

Alexander’s hands had been covered in blood–John hadn’t had much time to think about it yet, but Alex had staggered out of that camp clad in a red coat and with a weapon in hand. There weren’t many ways a prisoner could acquire either of those things.

“He will be fine, then?” the general said, his voice so unwavering and neutral John almost believed him to be unaffected.

The doctor faltered a little and looked away, opened his mouth only to close it again. 

“The boy was tortured, Sir. The wounds on his body will heal in time–some of the cuts on his arms are infected, and we will have to keep an eye on that, but otherwise, he should be fine.” He sighed. “He hasn’t woken yet, so I can’t say anything about his mental state. Those scars will take longer to heal. Be careful with him.”

As if he had to tell them that. Washington and John hadn’t been of the same opinion too often these past couple of days, but he could tell the general thought the same thing he did: They would lay down their lives if it meant Alex would never have to suffer like that again. Alex would stay at his desk where nothing could hurt him, both of them would be there to make sure, to protect him and make him smile again.

The general closed his eyes and swallowed thickly, then nodded. “Thank you.”

Lafayette looked from the man to John, doubt in his eyes, and he knew what he was asking. John shook his head and offered a tired smile. Washington was not fine, no matter how much he wanted them to think he was, and Laf could tell; he probably didn’t even need his confirmation.

A heavy sigh snapped his attention back to the general. “If you could give us a moment, gentlemen,” he said, looked from Lafayette to the medic with bloodshot eyes.

“Of course, Sir,” Laf said, saluted, and was gone with a light touch to John’s arm. He knew what that meant, and he _would_ fill his friend in later–he just didn’t know how much later yet.

The medic nodded. “Make sure he eats something when he wakes. Not too much, though. Start small. I don’t think they gave him nearly enough.”

No, they wouldn’t. Smith wouldn’t. On a logical level, John knew no one fed prisoners full rations, but on an emotional level, he was close to fuming. He didn’t hold on to that, though, and as they watched the medic walk off, he took a few deep breaths and calmed himself.

It was over, it was done, Alex was safely back with them, where they could smother him in affection until he was sick of it.

Washington shoved past the tent-flaps and John followed; Alex was where they had put him, but that horrible red coat was gone, and so was the filthy shirt he had worn hours prior. The marks of the whipping John knew to be there were hidden under the innocent white of bandages. His hands were free of the blood they’d been drenched in, and a bandage wrapped around the palm of one.

“Dear God,” Washington breathed out and sat heavily on the edge of the cot, as though he collapsed from the relief–or the heartache. Both, perhaps.

He gave Alex a quick once-over, probably trying to memorise where not to touch him, a hand hovering above his son’s matted curls. John recognised that; he wanted to touch, to comfort, but didn’t know if it would hurt him, if Alex would welcome it.

Finally, that hand settled, stroked strands of hair that hung into his face back and smoothed his messy hair down, light and gentle, loving, afraid.

“My boy,” he said, like he couldn’t believe it. He ducked his head, brow furrowed, looking like a man who was holding on by a thread. “My son, my Alexander, my brave, ridiculous boy.” His breath hitched, and something gave. 

The first sob that broke from him was so raw, it kicked John right over the edge again–all the fear and worry and downright terror at times, the lying awake at night wracked with guilt, plagued by thoughts of _I should have done something_ and _I should have been better,_ it all carried in that one sound, that one expression of deep sorrow and great happiness.

John plopped down onto the deserted stool and sat with Washington as they unloaded it all together, Alexander finally with them where he belonged again; and if the general’s hand ended up on John’s shoulder, against his nape, and if John clung to that hand like his life depended on it, well–no one but them would be any the wiser.


	9. Day Four (Part Three)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alex is awake!!! And they are all so tired!!!! Go to bed lads!!!

They sat there and just watched Alex breathe for a long time after they had calmed.

The exhaustion tugged heavy on John's limbs, put an iron weight on his eyelids; he couldn't imagine how Washington had to feel, as he was fairly sure that was his third night in a row without any real sleep.

Neither of them would go, though, they wouldn't rest until Alex woke, so they waited in silence–until they didn't.

"I'm sorry I hit you," Washington said, eyes fixed on his son's relaxed face as his fingers stroked tirelessly over his hair. "I mean, you deserved that first one. The other two were… unnecessary. That wasn't a very professional reaction."

John sighed and smiled, a small, tired, but genuinely happy thing.

"I dare say it was a very human reaction, Sir. I don't blame you."

Washington sighed, ripped his gaze away from Alex and looked John in the eyes, the corners of his mouth turned up the slightest bit, too mentally and physically drained to make it to a full smile.

“It wasn’t a reaction fit for a commander. I have no right to treat you that way, John, no one has.” He raised his free hand and laid it on the side of John’s neck, warm, calloused fingers a surprisingly comforting pressure on his nape. “And, well, you did bring my son back. I can’t thank you enough.”

John shook his head and looked back at Alexander; sweat stood on his brow, and it hit him that he still had that fever. He grabbed for a rag and wet it the basin on the table next to them, wiped it gently down Alex’s face.

Washington watched and, with a pat to his shoulder, pulled his hand back.

“Can I confess something, Sir?” he said, with a careful hope the general wouldn’t slap him again after he had just apologised for doing so in the first place.

He just raised an eyebrow in answer and gave him an expectant look.

“I really had no idea what I was doing the entire time I was doing it. I just needed to _do something_ , but Alex got himself out in the end. I was just there to catch him and bring him back to camp.”

Washington just sighed. “I hadn’t thought you had an actual plan, my boy. That’s one reason why I was so upset when we discovered you were gone. I know you better than that, Laurens.”

The side of John’s mouth lifted to a half-smile and he made to answer, but at that moment, Alex stirred.

* * *

There were fingers in his hair.

Smith had woken before him again.

Alex turned his head, hid his face in the- pillow? Odd, but the madman would have his reasons–and waited for the hand to grip and pull, to drag him up and make him meet cold, blue eyes.

A few moments passed, and nothing happened. He cracked his eyes open, but saw nothing but blurred shapes and fuzzy colours; he blinked, trying to clear his sight, and his other senses seemed to return to him one after the other.

“Alex?”

Oh, God. He’d know that voice anywhere. He shouldn’t- John was supposed to have left, but of course he wouldn’t, of course not, and now he was there with him, trapped just as Alex was-

He shot up from where he lay on his stomach, only to almost topple over and fall off the cot as blinding pain erupted across his back. Strong arms wrapped around his chest and caught him on his upper arm, and another pair of hands settled on his shoulders and carefully pressed him back until he was sat on the cot, and Alex stared back at John with wide eyes, his breath coming too quick and a heavy weight pressing in on his chest.

Why wouldn’t he just _leave_ and return to where he would be safe, that thickheaded son of a-

“Easy, my love. It’s all right, you’re safe.” 

Alex stopped dead. He’d know _that_ voice anywhere as well.

He whipped his head around and locked eyes with his father–his father, who looked worse than Alex felt, who rubbed a hand along his upper arm in a steadying manner and reached out to tuck Alex’s loose hair behind his ear.

God, how much he had craved that touch, how much he had despised the warped imitation Smith had taunted him with.

With how drained he felt, he wouldn’t have thought it possible he still had the stamina to cry, but his vision was shrouded with tears the instant it hit him: They had made it out. It hadn’t been a dream conjured up by Alex’s fever-tormented brain, he had killed Smith and made it out of that camp, and-

And they were _safe._

“Papa,” he choked out around a sob and almost climbed into his father’s lap in his hurry to get as close as possible to him as fast as he was able to.

He wrapped his arms around his back and held on, clung to him like he was a child again, buried his face in the crook of his father’s neck and sobbed with abandon. 

All of it, all the horrible, dark emotions that had gathered inside him since Smith had taken him, it all wanted to get out at once. He was distantly aware that he was being too loud, but he couldn’t stop it–all the hurt and shame, the pain and fear and the consuming rage, they formed a perfect storm inside him, one that needed to burst out before it ripped him apart.

His father in turn laid a hand just underneath the base of his neck, far enough up his back there weren’t any injuries, and put the other back on his arm, traced it up to his shoulder and down to his elbow in a rhythmic, soothing motion that made Alex cry all the harder for the care and love it expressed to him.

It seemed so long since someone had touched him in a way that wasn’t supposed to hurt or humiliate him.

“Oh, my sweet boy, my brave, wonderful boy, you’re safe now, we’ve got you, everything will be all right, dearheart,” he cooed at him, doing his best to comfort him even though Alex could hear the tears clear in his voice as he spoke, and pressed kisses to his hair, rubbed circles into the back of his neck with his thumb.

Alex didn’t say anything as he cried himself dry, finally back home and _safe_ in his father’s arms, just listened to him talk in that low, familiar, and comforting way of his, whisper soothing nonsense into his hair; but _fuck_ did it soothe him, did he relish in being able to hear it again at all.

When he had run out of tears, he leaned back a little, peeled himself away until they could see each other’s faces, and smiled up at him–that was his first genuine smile in quite a while, and it felt so good. He felt lighter; the storm had passed.

His father took his face between his hands and wiped away his drying tears with practised sweeps of his thumbs.

Alex grasped both his wrists and held on, sniffled a little as he tried to get his bearings back. “I’m so sorry,” he said. Then, because he’d been afraid he would never get another chance to say it again, “I love you, Papa.”

“Lord, Alex,” he said, choked up. “Don’t apologise. I love you too, my heart, so much, and don’t you forget it.” He kissed the crown of his head, his forehead, both his cheeks, and Alex’s eyes slipped shut as he let himself enjoy the affection, given so freely.

Alex was reluctant to move off his father, but he had other business to attend to. Business in the shape of the wonderful idiot he had fallen in love with and who watched him from tired but happy eyes as he turned to face him.

He took a moment to look John up and down, to make sure he hadn’t somehow been hurt while Alex was out, but he seemed whole and healthy at first glance; so Alex didn’t feel bad when he struck out and slapped him across the face. It wasn’t a hard slap, anyway, but it was the thought that counted.

John, to his credit, looked neither surprised nor offended.

“That one’s definitely yours, Sir,” he said as he got up from his stool and sat next to Alex instead, close enough his warmth enveloped him like a favourite blanket.

Alex didn’t ask what the fuck he was talking about, he just put a hand to his face and drew him closer until he could kiss him.

The second their lips touched, something tight in Alex’s chest relaxed and uncoiled itself, like a weight lifting. He sighed against him as John exhaled, his shoulders losing their tension as well, and cupped Alex’s face in both hands, kissed him back soft and slow as he caressed his cheeks.

He made no move to take control of the kiss, and Alex felt like crying again–John was so sweet, so considerate, and he knew when he had to be careful with him, even when Alex wouldn’t admit to it.

“You colossal moron,” Alex said after they had separated and sniffled through the smitten smile that stole itself onto his features. “I love you so much.”

John’s eyes glistened with a sheen of tears and he pressed another gentle kiss to his lips. “God, darling,” Alex’s breath hitched at the term of endearment; he hadn’t been aware of how much he’d missed hearing it. “I love you too. These past couple days, I couldn’t even think straight, I-”

“We hadn’t noticed,” his father quipped from behind him, and Alex couldn’t help but snicker, even if it sounded a little wet.

“I knew that whole thing wasn’t your idea, Pa.”

“Of course not, that idiot boy went off on his own after I told him not to, but really, I should have expected that. That was on me,” he said. John smiled sheepishly past Alex–he didn’t have to turn around to know the look he received in return was as unamused as it got.

His chest seized; he had missed them so much.

Alex dropped his forehead to John’s shoulder as his eyes clouded over again and tried to keep his breathing even. He was safe now; Pa had said so, and Pa never lied to him.

“Darling…” John mumbled and carded his fingers through the tangles on the back of Alex’s head. “Can you tell us what happened? How you got out, I mean?”

Alex stiffened and swallowed, reached behind him and swiped his hand around blindly until he found his father’s and grasped it; he probably held on too tight, but he didn’t get a word of complaint, so he didn’t ease up.

“I- I knew you wouldn’t leave. I knew you would try something stupid and get yourself killed, so I- I decided to do something stupid, too,” he began. His father squeezed his hand encouragingly, and John pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

“I was about to do something stupid when you came out and met me,” he said casually, in an attempt to lighten the mood somewhat. Alex chuckled, but it felt more like a sob.

“I stole a scalpel from the medic,” he went on. His father shifted nearer and laid his other hand over their clasped ones, and that simple act alone kept his breathing from picking up.

“I waited until… Smith,” he pressed out, the name leaving a taste like rot on his tongue. “fell asleep. I cut the rope.” The hand he had cut into as he did so lay on John’s lap and his unfocused eyes caught on it; a white bandage wrapped around his injured palm. “Only cut myself up a little bit.”

“Was that where all that blood came from?” John asked, voice soft, and rubbed his shoulder.

Alex closed his eyes as something bright and cold like ice flashed in the darkness of his mind. 

“Not exactly,” he said and began to count along with every breath he took, as he had made a habit of over the course of the last three days. “I, umm, I didn’t just leave.” His grip on his father’s hand tightened–it had to be uncomfortable by now, but he just stroked over the back of his hand and let him hold on like it was his lifeline.

Alex hated how shaky his voice was all of a sudden, but no matter how many calming breaths he took, it wouldn’t steady; so he pressed on. 

“I took his dagger, and- well, he was asleep, he didn’t notice, I was quiet, and-”

“Darling-” John began, probably about to tell him he didn’t need to finish, as it was quite obvious where the story was going, but he cut him off.

“I stabbed him straight through the throat. Twice. That woke him. He- he stared at me the entire time, and it took _so long,_ so long for him to bleed out, and he just kept looking, and I kept looking, I watched, I don’t know why I did, but I couldn’t _move-_ ” he broke off into a choked sob and pressed his face to John’s neck as John held him close and played with his hair, and Pa moved even closer, a comforting presence at his back.

“That- that was his coat, huh?” John asked, careful and in a way that suggested he already knew. Alex just nodded without a word and cried until he couldn’t for a second time that night.

“I’m so proud of you, son,” his father said in that soft voice he only ever used behind closed doors, when they were on their own. Alex’s breath hitched. “You thought quickly and did what it took, and the idiot you fell for for some godforsaken reason was in the right place at the right time to get both of you back to safety. And now it’s over.”

“And now it’s over,” John echoed and pressed another kiss to his head.

Alex sniffed and moved himself back upright, scrubbed at his tear-stained face with the back of his free hand and grabbed John’s when he was done with that.

John lifted that hand and kissed his knuckles, and Alex smiled despite himself. He looked over at his father, who watched him with such a sense of relief and warm, glowing happiness, of pride, love, and dedication, but also worry and grief on his behalf, that Alex felt himself tear up again.

“You should rest, my love. You are ill and still have a lot of recovery to do before I’ll let you even come near a desk.”

Alex nodded and closed his eyes, swallowed thickly. “You’re right. You’re right, but- I mean-” He blinked his eyes back open and looked from his father to John, down at their linked hands. “Just don’t leave me alone. Please. I don’t want to be alone again.”

John looked at him with utter heart-break written all over his face, and his father kissed his temple, but Alex didn’t turn, afraid to see what would be on his.

“Of course not, darling,” John said.

“We’ll be right here, don’t you worry,” his father added, and Alex felt himself engulfed in warmth–but the good kind this time.


	10. Day Four (Part Four)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which the only thing John cares about is Alex, but what else is fucking new, amiright

That afternoon, after they had helped Alex move to their own tent and got him comfortable there–well, as comfortable as possible, that was–John made his way to headquarters.

The others involved in this goddamned affair had of course heard he had made it back with Alex, but no one knew what happened yet; the general hadn’t left his son’s side once, and he wouldn’t for the foreseeable future, John knew. Washington couldn’t take his eyes off Alex, he spent every waking moment sitting at his bedside and watching him sleep, kept him entertained and feeling safe for the short bouts he was awake.

John understood, oh could he relate. He wanted nothing more than to spend every available second with Alexander, if just to make sure he was there, that he was protected and well cared for and comfortable; the fact that he thought someone had to fill their friends in didn’t mean he would let that keep him any longer than was strictly necessary.

The second he set a foot into headquarters, the tent fell silent. Every aide present stared at him, some with surprise, some with anger–they knew what he had done, they had lived through the aftermath, more so than he had. A few looked worried, though; he didn’t know how much of the whole situation the others had disclosed to them while he had been missing in action, if anything at all, but before he had left, they had kept it quiet. No one had lost a word about what happened that day in that clearing.

That was very suspicious, he was aware. They had returned one man short after all, and it had been a man whose absence was not easy to miss–they didn’t call him the little lion for nothing. Alex had an air about him that was impossible not to notice and left a very obvious scar when removed.

They had known Alex was missing, or at least in no condition to work. They had watched the general’s state deteriorate. 

And now, John was back and they had yet to see even a glimpse of Washington. It was all very suspicious.

John didn’t care. 

Lafayette zeroed in on him immediately, and he hurried towards him just as Tilghman put the stack of papers he’d been holding down and headed his way as well. Burr took a moment to stare, in typical fashion for him, always waiting for something, for the other shoe to drop, but he eventually decided to join them.

He turned and walked off without having uttered a single word to the other occupants of the tent. They kept the silence until they reached the tent Lafayette shared with Burr and ducked inside; as soon as they were out of the public eye, Tilghman, vibrating with nervous energy, blurted out, 

“Hamilton is back, then? You actually did it? Is he all right? What about the general?”

“I can’t believe whatever stupid plan you concocted worked out,” Burr said with narrowed eyes, his arms crossed tighly over his chest.

“I don’t even care anymore, what about Alexander?” Lafayette threw in.

They all watched him, expectant, as John stood there and tried to come up with the shortest way to phrase that whole story.

He settled on covering the basics and leaving the details up to imagination. How he’d gotten into the camp, was thrown back out, and how Alex had met him at the gates–how Alex had slit his captors throat as he slept and freed himself, how he had made it out on his own, injured, feverish, and in pain as he was.

“He’s resting. It will take some time for him to recover, and the general has been staying with him, as I have. Alex is… rattled,” he finished.

“Good Lord,” Burr said and left it at that.

“Mon dieu,” Lafayette agreed and rubbed his hands together, the unease rolling off of him in waves. “Mon petit lion… he will be all right, though, won’t he, John?”

John shifted on the spot and didn’t meet his friend’s eyes. Of course he would like to think everything would be back to normal in no time at all, but he knew it wouldn’t be that easy. Alexander was hurt, and he would continue to hurt for some time to come; it wasn’t just his body, as the medic had said that night, his mind would bear scars, too.

He startled awake more often than not, most likely by a nightmare he refused to share with either of them when they asked, and he insisted on touching and being touched when he was awake, but would wake in a state like panic when they touched him while he slept.

Washington and him would be there every step of the way, of course, no matter how many steps that way would end up being.

“I… hope so, Laf. It’s hard to say,” he said at last, after his silence had already stretched too long.

Lafayette closed his eyes and nodded. He had probably expected an answer along those lines, but that didn’t make it any easier to hear.

They fell silent for a few moments, each stewing in their own thoughts on the matter, before Tilghman spoke up again.

“Not to take this away from Hamilton and how he absolutely kicked that creep’s ass, but- well, I have to admit I’m not entirely convinced about that thing with him and the general being some spontaneous, clever plot. He’s been sitting with Hamilton the whole day, we haven’t even seen him since yesterday.”

John just stared and wondered if he would find the energy and willpower needed to have that conversation again.

“He’s worried. Alex went through all that, through, need I remind you, actual _fucking_ torture to save his life, to save our lives. Maybe you would do good in expressing some more gratitude instead of doubting him at every turn, Tilghman.” He would have mentally patted himself on the back for how plausible that explanation sounded if he wasn’t so tired of that line of questioning. Besides, he had spent enough time there; it was high time he got back to Alex.

Tilghman had the good sense to avert his gaze in shame and mutter out an apology while Burr just kept looking at him like he had caught John in a lie. John decidedly did not care at all. 

He clapped Laf on the shoulder and excused himself, was out of the tent and out of sight before anyone could say anything else.

Washington sat on John’s own cot when he came back into the tent. His eyes shone with poorly concealed worry as he watched the medic clean Alexander’s arms.

Alex himself was awake and sitting up, and his gaze found John the instant he entered. He looked so tired, John thought. Sickly. Pale, with his hands shaking where the medic had a hold on one of his wrists to allow for better access to the wounds–and Lord, there were so _many._

John hadn’t gotten a good look at his arms yet, the last time he had seen them bare they had been covered in dried blood, but now that he could see them, a spike of whitehot anger shot through him. Alex’s arms were completely cut up, a mess of red lines and raised skin. It didn’t even look like there had been any method to how the wounds had been inflicted; the placements seemed random, some cuts longer than others, some even bending and changing direction, as though Smith had been drawing lines on a piece of parchment instead of human skin.

And, of course, some were a deep, angry red–infected. As if Alex hadn’t suffered enough already.

“Hm,” the doctor hummed. John glanced from Alex to Washington and back, not sure if that was a good sound or not.

“Well, the good news is that the infection is unlikely to spread. The cuts are shallow, so as long as they are cleaned properly, it should be fine.”

“And the bad news?” Alex asked before either Washington or him could do it.

The doctor picked up a roll of bandages and got to work wrapping his arms back up with smooth, practised movements. “They will scar. Not badly, and they might fade over time, but they will be there and you will have to see them.”

Alex didn’t say anything to that, just watched with glassy eyes as the damage disappeared beneath white fabric; John ached with the need to hold him, to tell him how loved he was and reassure him that everything would be all right.

He stayed where he was, though. The doctor did a truly masterful job at pretending the situation was normal, that treating an aide in his own tent instead of the sickbay was procedure and that the continued presence of the actual head of their army was not unusual at all–but if John were to cuddle up to his patient, to kiss him and whisper sweet words to him, well. That would surely be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

When Alex laid back down on his stomach, face turned towards the canvas and away from them, John averted his gaze. He wouldn’t watch the man clean those wounds, he didn’t want to know how many lashes exactly Alex had suffered through on their behalf; he couldn’t face that reality, not yet.

Washington seemed to share the sentiment, as his eyes were fixed firmly on the ground beneath his feet.

“Well, at least these don’t show any sign of infection,” the doctor said, like that was supposed to lift their spirits.

“Fabulous,” Alex responded, dryly and muffled against the pillow, and the medic snorted a laugh. John thought nothing about the situation funny, but he supposed the man was numb to things like that by now; he saw a lot worse, after all.

When he was done with the cleaning, Alex sat back up to give the doctor better access to dress the wounds. He pulled his shirt back on, wincing as he did, and John pressed his lips together and refrained from showing any outward reaction to that, even though the sound jabbed into his heart like a knife.

“Until tomorrow, Hamilton,” the medic said and picked his satchel back up.

“Looking forward to it,” Alex answered with a humourless smile. He seemed to be getting back to his usual self rather quickly, but John didn’t fully trust that development.

It was obvious he was still in a lot of pain, a lot of turmoil–but he wouldn’t push it. Alex would open up in his own time, pushing an issue with him had never once worked out in a way that hadn’t ended in a screaming-match.

The doctor left, and they were alone. Washington was instantly back at Alex’s side, but John stayed at his spot for the time being. He had to give them some space; he couldn’t put his finger on what it was that made him so sure of that, but something had shifted in their relationship–or perhaps something had shifted in the way John perceived their relationship.

While he had always thought them to be close, closer than he had ever been with his own father, in any case, something had been different since Alex first woke.

Alexander seemed desperate for his father, for his presence and the easy way he showed him affection, just as Washington was desperate to be close to Alex at all times.

That was fine with John. He knew where he stood, and he knew Alex needed him, but he had been through something horrible and traumatic; it only made sense that he would turn to his father for the aftermath, someone who had always given him a sense of security and who loved him without question or condition, no matter what.

“Are you hungry?” Washington asked, words soft and expression open, unguarded. 

It blindsided John every time anew when he saw him like that–General Washington, commander in chief of the continental army, a stoic, no nonsense, hard-boiled veteran of many a conflict, looking so kind and tender-hearted. He only got like that around his son, or at least that was when John had seen it, and especially when Alexander was vulnerable; when he was sick, or hurt, or sad. At that instance, he was all of those things, and the general’s demeanor reflected that.

Alex just shook his head, the movement small and lethargic, and let his father put a gentle hand to his forehead, then to his cheek. John could tell from the expression on Washington’s face that he still had a temperature, which was, well. Not optimal.

“I’m just tired,” Alex said as the general removed his hand, and brought his own up to his face, rubbed at his eyes.

John and Washington shared a look. Alex never admitted to being tired. That man kept going until he collapsed, and under normal circumstances, it would test the patience of a saint to get him to rest when he was sick.

They had a long way to go, it seemed.

“Of course,” Washington said, still in that same quiet, sympathetic tone he adopted whenever he addressed his son. “Rest, dearheart. Your body has a lot of repairing to do.”

He kissed the top of his head, and Alex smiled up at him and nodded. Washington got back up and switched to the chair John had dragged in there, the one formerly occupied by the medic, to give Alex some space.

Alexander probably noticed they tended to move away from him when he was about to fall asleep, but he didn’t comment, and as long as he didn’t say anything, they would keep doing it.

“John?” he said, and John shook himself out of his daydreaming.

“Yes, darling?”

Alex looked up at him from where he still sat on the cot, a faint dusting of pink on his cheekbones, and fuck, he looked so _helpless_ like that, so vulnerable it yanked John’s heartstrings so hard it almost hurt.

“Can I have a kiss?”

That man would be the death of him, he thought, his heart swelling in his chest.

John grinned like a fool as he sat down next to Alex, cupped his jaw and kissed him, poured all the love and adoration he could into the soft press of their lips.

“If I ever say no to that,” he said when they had separated and put another kiss to his brow. “please just put me out of my misery.”

Alex chuckled and leaned their forehead together, stole another quick kiss.

“For God’s sake, Laurens, the boy is supposed to _rest_ ,” the general said, unamused but lacking the venom a situation as such would have called for from him a mere week ago.

“Yes, Sir, sorry, Sir,” he responded and kissed Alex again, just because he could, before he stood and sat on his cot instead. 

Washington shook his head at him, but didn’t comment further as Alex laid back down and curled up on his side, facing away from them.

His smile dropped as he looked at that back, bandages peeking out from the neckline of his shirt. There were so many things Alex hadn’t told them yet, things John knew ate away at him–the nightmares were proof enough of that.

He looked over at Washington; his face had closed off, the mask of the unaffected commander back in place, but the worry-lines between his furrowed brows, on his forehead, at the pinched corners of his mouth betrayed his concern.

John sighed quietly and smiled, even though it probably looked unconvinced. He would stay positive, remain optimistic, for Alex. Lord knew the last thing he needed was the burden of John’s emotions added to the weight of the world already on his shoulders.


	11. Day Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This... is literally just pure fluff with a pinch of angst thrown in for a little spice.  
> I am SOFT and these boys deserve it, okay?? Don't @ me

Alex woke to phantom hands on his body, fingers in his hair, on his shoulders, digging into his open wounds; the ghost of foul breath on his face, a disembodied voice taunting him.

He jerked halfway upright before the sharp pull on the welts on his back forced him to a stop. His heavy, too fast breaths cut through the silence of the dark tent, and he carefully moved himself into a proper sitting position as sweat dripped from his forehead. His hands shook when he lowered them into his lap.

That man just wouldn’t leave him alone.

“Darling?” a groggy voice sounded next to him, and it hit Alex where exactly he was.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you,” he said, but his efforts to keep his words calm and level were for naught–he sounded upset, even to his own ears.

“It’s fine,” John muttered. A hand settled on his upper arm and tugged with gentle insistence, and Alex went along with it, laid back down almost completely on top of John, his head tucked under his chin and their chests rising and falling in tandem against each other.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he said and stroked Alex’s hair, like he had done a thousand times before, like he usually did when he wanted to comfort him–it sent a shiver down his spine. Alex shook himself and made a conscious effort to relax under the touch.

He turned his face, buried his nose in the collar of John’s nightshirt and inhaled deeply; the scent was familiar, like a warm fire during a long winter, rain after a drought, a salty breeze from the ocean. It smelled like home. 

It was just John. He was safe.

“No,” he said, but it felt wrong as soon as the statement had left his mouth. Did he want to talk about it? About Smith?

No. Yes. Perhaps. Not with John.

“I… I need to speak to my father, I think,” he mumbled. It was late, though, and he loathed the prospect of waking him up now, after they had spent a good twenty minutes that evening convincing him to go to bed, that they would be just fine without him there. Alex knew he needed the rest; he couldn’t imagine his father had taken proper care of himself while he had been gone, and especially not after they had made it back.

But Smith just wouldn’t leave him _alone,_ and his father had known him, and- and Alex needed answers.

The hand on his head stilled. 

“Now?” John asked, doubtful. He probably had the same reservations about that as Alex did, but it couldn’t be helped now.

“Yes.”

John exhaled a loud breath, something that might have been a sigh if he had been more awake, and kissed the top of his head. 

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll take you.”

Alex smiled into John’s neck. Tomorrow he would be annoyed that John thought him so fragile he needed an escort down a couple rows of tents, but at that moment, his worry filled his chest with warmth. 

He raised himself up to hover above him and looked down into his face–he could just barely make out his eyes, the line of his nose, the curve of his lips.

Alex ducked down and pressed a kiss to those lips, another to the corner of his mouth.

“You will do no such thing. Go back to sleep, John,” he said. John’s hands came up to cup his face, and a thumb swept along the arch of his cheekbone.

“And what if something happens, huh?”

Alex snorted, kissed him again. “What’s supposed to happen? The walk takes literally a minute, I think I can manage on my own for that long.”

John heaved a proper sigh that time. “If you’re absolutely certain you feel up for it-”

“I am,” he said and kissed his cheek. “Sleep, my love.”

“Fine,” he breathed out, giving in even though Alex could hear his reluctance clear as day. John pressed a lingering kiss to his forehead and let his hands drop away. “Don’t push yourself. I love you.”

“Love you, too,” he said and peeled himself out of the covers, slipped his boots on without bothering to tie them, and stepped out into the night.

The walk may have been less than a minute, actually, and Alex thought it did him some good. He hadn’t moved any noteworthy amount in over twenty-four hours, and it felt nice to stretch his stiff muscles.

He didn’t knock or say something to announce his presence; no matter what he could have said, if someone were to overhear, it would have raised eyebrows. It was long after midnight, after all, and if he went for a ‘It’s Hamilton, Sir’, it would only feed the disgusting, unsavoury kinds of rumours that circulated camp. What _would_ an aide want in his superior’s private tent at that hour? No thanks, Alex had heard enough of those to be traumatised for life.

The alternative of calling out to his father and identifying him as such wasn’t any better, though. The situation was sticky enough for them without Alex straight up admitting to the nature of their relation.

So, Alex wormed a hand into the crack between the flaps of canvas and undid the fastenings on the inside; it wasn’t the first time he had broken into someone else’s tent, he knew what he was doing.

He slipped in and secured the fastenings again, fumbling a bit in the dark. The cot creaked behind him, and a metallic clink reached his ears–a pistol being cocked. His father had been a light sleeper as long as Alex had known him, and paranoid on top of that.

“It’s me, Pa,” he said.

His father let out a long, controlled breath and dropped the gun on the nightstand, judging by the wooden _thunk,_ and a few moments later Alex had to squint against the light of a newly lit oil-lamp.

When he turned to face him, he was presented with his father’s patented look of parental disapproval, worry, and tired resignation.

“What have I told you about sneaking up on me, Alexander?”

“Sorry,” Alex said and swallowed the lump that formed in his throat as he reminded himself why he was there in the first place. “I just… need to talk to you.”

The disapproval morphed into a look of soft understanding instantly, and his father moved to sit on the edge of the cot, stretched his arm out to his side in invitation.

“Come here, love.”

Alex sure as hell didn’t have to be told twice. He sat next to him and slid off his boots, fit himself neatly to his father's side, and swung his legs up onto the cot, tucked them underneath himself as his father’s arm settled around his shoulders.

“Tell me if I hurt you,” he said quietly with a careful squeeze to his shoulders. Alex nodded, knowing full well he wouldn’t actually.

He had made that mistake before. As soon as he had, his father had withdrawn from him, had only touched his head or his hands for weeks after, and Alex really couldn’t afford that kind of nonsense right now.

He had longed for his father’s touch, and he could take a bit of accidental pain if it meant he got to keep it.

Satisfied with his little white lie, his father smiled at him, indulgent. 

“So, what business brings you my way in the middle of the night? Is John’s snoring that bad?”

Alex snickered, even as an overwhelming sense of happiness unfurled in his chest. It meant so much, more than he could say, really, that his father not only acknowledged their relationship, but also attempted to joke about it with him, as though it was the most ordinary thing in the world. It was just amazing to Alex how far he had come.

“I’m used to John’s snoring,” he said, and his mirth fell away as fast as it had appeared. “No, I- umm. I mean-”

His father watched him stutter from now obviously worried eyes- _you have his eyes,_ spoken in that tone of mocking delight, reverberated around his head, clear and loud as if the bastard had just said it to him.

He swallowed as tears shot to his eyes. “How did you know Smith?” he finally forced out.

The arm around his shoulders tightened. His father looked down, away from him, and he didn’t answer for several moments.

“We served together,” he admitted, still not meeting his eye. “In the french and indian war. We were… acquaintances. Not friends, not close, but we knew each other well enough, I suppose. Saved my life, once.”

Alex watched his father’s face as he talked, but he had closed himself off to him–he couldn’t read him, he was too careful to conceal his thoughts.

He hated it when he did that. Alex felt his lower lip quiver and took it between his teeth to still it, felt the sob build in his chest and sniffled.

That drew his father’s attention. His eyes softened as he took in Alex's pathetic state, and he brought his other hand up to Alex's chin, put his thumb just underneath where his lip was caught between his teeth, and tugged gently.

"How often do I have to tell you to quit doing that?"

Alex hiccuped a weak laugh. "You're not my boss."

His father regarded him with raised brows. "Aren't I? You are on my payroll for some reason. Better take you off, then," he said, and Alex chuckled. He felt like he was going insane with how fast his mood was swinging between devastated and cackling like an idiot.

His father sobered as he looked back at him, took note of the tears still unshed in his eyes.

"Something was off about him, even back then," he said and pulled Alex closer again. "That's what stopped me from getting too close. He took pleasure in taking lives." 

Alex's hands began to tremble in his lap, and he balled his fists until his nails cut into his palm; his injured hand thanked him with a dull throb of pain.

His father watched with furrowed brows and reached out with his free hand, gently worked his fists back open, and hummed his disapproval.

"Don't, Alexander."

Alex swallowed. His tongue felt too big for his mouth. "Sorry."

Neither of them said anything for a short while, before Alex couldn't take the silence any longer.

"So, what I'm hearing is, that guy had always been a massive weirdo," he said, and his father snorted a laugh. It sounded pained, but Alex pretended he hadn’t noticed.

"You could say so," he agreed, and sighed. "I suppose that's the kind of man boys who enjoy war too much grow into."

Alex just rested more of his weight against his father and let his eyes slip shut for a moment.

“He talked like he knew you,” he said, eyes still closed, and hoped the out of place feeling of betrayal every time he remembered the confident air with which Smith had spoken about his father didn’t carry in his voice or show on his face. He knew it wasn’t his fault, he knew he hadn’t meant for any of that to happen, but the fact that man, that disgusting man, had had a prior history with his father- it just didn’t sit right with him.

A sigh hit the top of his head, followed by a short press of lips. Alex smiled, despite himself.

“He probably thought he knew me… and maybe he did, back then, if just a little. But Alex, that was so long ago–I was a different man back then. Lord, I was barely even a man at all, I must have been younger than you are now when I first met Smith.”

Alex opened his eyes and looked up at his father, but he had turned away again, an expression like he was somewhere else, far away, on his features. A different place, a different time, in the company of someone else.

“How were you different?” he asked, just because he needed something to distract him from the goddamn tremor that took hold of his hands again. He hoped that fun little gimmick would fuck off sooner rather than later–he wouldn’t be able to write like that.

His father chuckled as he returned to there and then, back to Alex and their conversation. “Oh, I was very different. I honestly don’t think you would have liked me back then; I had a quick temper, for one, and was prone to angry outbursts over the stupidest of things, sometimes. Hotheaded. Brash. Too loud, probably. I drank too much, never thought anything through to the end, picked fights, and- Lord, was I _reckless_ back then. If you even attempted to pull one of the idiotic stunts I did, I would have you shipped back home to Martha.”

Alex’s brow furrowed more and more the longer he listened, and he shook his head when he had finished, backed up a little and stared at his father with narrowed eyes. It even slipped his mind to comment on that thing about being sent back home.

Alex blinked. At least his hands had stopped shaking. “You… do realise you just described John, right?”

A slow smile crept over his father’s features, a smile that turned into a grin, even though he obviously tried to hide it.

“Huh,” he said. “I guess I did… maybe you would have liked me _too much,_ then.”

Alex groaned and hid his face in his hands as his father ruffled a hand through his hair, trying and failing to choke back laughter. Mortification settled cold and hard in his stomach, spread to his limbs and made them feel tingly and off.

“ _Ew,_ ” he said, a bit too loud. “Don’t say things like that, Pa!”

“All right, all right,” he said, his amusement finally dying down. “I’m sorry, dearheart. But also, you were the one to point it out.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled and dropped his hands back into his lap; his perfectly steady hands. Hm.

They sat in silence for a minute, but then his father nudged his arm gently, muttered a soft, “Hey.”

“Hey?” Alex repeated with raised brows.

He looked back at him, serious once again, but his expression was still open, still readable to Alex.

“I only counted off negative things. What is it that you actually _like_ about John?”

Alex blinked once in confusion and lowered his gaze as heat crept up his neck and into his cheeks. That wasn’t part of the joke–his father genuinely wanted to know.

“He’s really sweet,” he began after a short pause, quiet and, Lord help him, _shy._ “And kind. Patient. He doesn’t mind listening to my ranting, and he’s- well. Just a strong person. He’s dedicated and passionate, and really intelligent.”

He regarded him with an odd look Alex couldn’t place, but it was replaced by a thoughtful expression soon after–there was a slight twist to his lips, though, and that told him he wasn’t being serious.

“In light of recent events… are we sure about that last thing?”

Alex rolled his eyes and swatted at his father’s shoulder, but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face no matter how hard he tried. “Don’t be mean, Pa.”

“I’m just saying, _intelligent_ wouldn’t have been the word I-”

“Papa!”

Alex dissolved into helpless giggles as his father chuckled along with him, a warm, familiar sound from deep in his chest, and Alex was- content. He was content, for the first time in a while.

“I just want you to know,” he said after they had calmed down, and cupped Alex’s nape. He leaned into the touch; it reminded him of home, too. “if it’s really a man you want… we can find you a better one.”

“No, I want that one,” he replied without hesitation, his heart threatening to burst out of his chest with how much it had just swelled. He had always known his father had nothing against people like him, like John–but that didn’t stop him from worrying when he first got into a relationship with John. He’d feared it would be different for his father when it wasn’t just some stranger, but his own son; and it hadn’t been easy in the beginning, far from it, but he had come around to them, and to hear him say something like that-

It made him forget about his troubles and sorrows for a while. He was truly, stupidly happy as he sat on his father’s cot in the early hours of a new day and listened to him make fun of the man Alex loved.

His father sighed, exaggerated. “Fine. If that’s what you want, I’ll allow it.”

“Lucky me,” he shot back, dryly. Then, after a beat, more subdued than before, “Thank you, Papa.”

“Oh, Alex…” he sighed and brought both his hands to Alex’s face, looked at him with such adoration that it made him ache. “You are one of the most important things in my life, dearheart. You have to know that there is nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”

Alex swallowed, a lump back in his throat. That knowledge, so effortlessly spoken into existence by his father, lay heavy on his shoulders, his conscience. There were things Alex wouldn’t want him to do for him, but that was a topic for another night–his mind was tranquil for once, there was no part of him that tingled with the touch of invisible hands, no voice whispering to him from behind.

He took a deep breath; his eyes were wet, but his smile sincere. “I love you, Pa.”

His father kissed his forehead, his temple, and tugged him close again, mindful of his injuries and deliberate in where he placed his arms; at no point did he accidentally hurt Alex.

“I love you too, my heart,” he said, pressed another kiss to his hair. “More than you know.”


	12. Day Six (Part One)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: There's description of a panic attack in this chapter. Stay safe luvs
> 
> So! This is a bit shorter than usual because my bitchass wrote a chapter that was Too Long and I had to split it at the pov shift :) I'll probably post the other half today, tomorrow at the latest.
> 
> Alex contemplates that he probably has ptsd without knowing that ptsd is and proceeds to have a bad time™, or as I like to say: The boy has had his break, it's time to SUFFER

Alex sat on his cot, his legs folded underneath himself and a book open in his lap. He had no clue what it was about–he couldn't focus for long enough to find out, but he wouldn't just give up and put it away. Maybe, if he kept staring down at the pages long enough, his brain would shake awake and be able to make sense of the words.

There wasn't much to do anyway, so it didn't matter if he wasted his time like that. He wasn't allowed to do anything; he _could,_ theoretically, if he wanted to. Because he was alone. It was the first time since they had made it back that either John or his father had left him for more than a couple of minutes at a time–or for the night, in his father's case.

They were off trying to smooth things over at headquarters, had come up with a plan and a story and everything. Alex had been present when they had, of course, but he couldn't recall a single thing about it. He had been drifting, it seemed. He did that a lot lately.

They deserved a break from him, though, so Alex didn't care about the finer details concerning the circumstances of that break.

He knew he could be a lot, and he was _clinging,_ he was aware, and- and he just wasn't getting better fast enough. It was pathetic.

So no, Alex didn't mind that they had left. It gave him time to think, which would have been nice if his thoughts weren't so… scattered, as of late. Running too fast for him to get a hold of one for one moment, crawling along syrupy like honey the next.

He did think about his mother a lot- well, mothers, more like. Probably because he missed the one he still had, and because he knew his father did, too. He could tell, even though Pa liked to hide his own pain from Alex. 

She would know what to do with him, recognise what was wrong with him and help him fix it–she had spent the last twenty years of her life looking after another stubborn soldier, after all, and she excelled at it. Ma was familiar with all the things war could do to one’s head.

She had been the one to introduce the rule of ‘no sneaking up on Pa’ that his father still liked to remind him of to that day, and had been vigilant in enforcing it, had sometimes added on a subclause of ‘no loud sounds around Pa’ and wrangled three rowdy children into obeying.

Alex had thought it odd back then, when he was a child of eight or nine, but he understood now. He had grown up to be a soldier like his father, no matter how often the man himself had tried to dissuade him from that choice of occupation, and he, too, had the sounds of canonfire and gunshots and screaming deeply ingrained into his mind.

That was what was happening to him, probably. The same thing that had Pa wake at the slightest of sounds and reach for his pistol, that had made him twitch into the beginnings of a fighting-stance every time Jacky had jumped out of somewhere and startled him, the same thing that had made him drop to the ground with glazed over eyes at the slam of a door once. 

With Alex, it was different, though. It was touches that set him off, the ones he hadn’t seen coming, and it were whispers that haunted his dreams instead of the sound of canonfire.

Weak. Pathetic. At least his father had real reason to be unsettled.

Ma wouldn’t see it that way. _Be gentle to yourself, Alexander,_ she would say, and Alex would ask _why_ and she would smile at him with a hint of what he’d later recognise to be sadness, and keep silent.

He missed her. Alex wished he could at least write to her, but that would seem odd–granted, an aide writing to his commander’s wife and making polite smalltalk wasn’t unheard of, but he could hardly write her what he really wanted to say. If someone were to intercept that letter, it would raise a lot of uncomfortable questions.

He sighed and ran a thumb along the edges of the book in his lap; how long he had been sitting there and staring down at it, motionless, he couldn’t say, but it couldn’t have been for a healthy amount of time.

A sharp knock on the tent-post ripped him out of his contemplations, and he snapped his head up. 

“Come in,” he said, expecting John or his father for some reason, even though he knew damn well they seldom ever knocked before they came in.

To his mild surprise, the tent-flaps fluttered shut behind none other than Aaron Burr.

Alex blinked once in confusion. His thoughts crept along like an injured insect, and for a few moments it was like his brain had forgotten how to have a social interaction with anyone not John or Pa.

“Well, if it isn’t Aaron Burr,” he said into the awkward silence created by his own hesitancy and summoned a sly smirk to his face. Burr was clever. Alex had to pretend he was fine in front of him.

“Alexander,” he greeted and inclined his head, a pleasant if slightly worried smile on his lips. His eyes were as sharp as ever, Alex noted, and they flickered from his face to the book in his lap, from there to his bandaged arms, up to his collarbone where he knew a flash of white was visible from the neckline of his shirt.

Alex clapped the book shut–that caught Burr’s attention again, and he focused back on Alex’s face. Good.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Laurens and the general are back at headquarters at last, so I assumed you were on your own–I came to see how you are doing.”

Alex frowned. That… raised several red flags. If Burr weren’t his friend–somewhat–he would have been unnerved by that line of thought. Why did he need to get him alone? If he had come to check on him, he could have done so in the presence of either John or his father.

“You do realise how suspicious that sounds, right? What is it you really want?” he said, brow furrowed and fingers tightening around the book in his grasp. Was he getting nervous? He shouldn’t be getting nervous. It was just Burr.

Burr sighed, rubbed a hand down his face and took another couple steps into the tent; Alex sat up straighter, squared his shoulders.

“Look, Alexander, I- well, first of all, I really wanted to check in on you, but you don’t seem to be in the mood for company, so I’ll keep this short.”

He paused, but Alex didn’t say anything, so he heaved another sigh and kept going. “You know I consider you a friend.”

Alex nodded.

“Good. Keep that in mind and don’t be alarmed.” Alex did not like where this was going. Burr turned and looked over his shoulder as though to check if there was someone in front of the tent who could overhear, stepped further still into the room, and spoke in a hushed voice.

“I know about you and Laurens. And so does Tilghman–I’m sorry about that, I blurted that out in front of the others. Not one of my finer moments, I admit. But Lafayette and the general knew already, didn’t they?”

Alex stared and didn’t answer. He felt the familiar sensation of a tremor starting up in his hands, and he gripped the book tighter, tight enough his knuckles appeared white as bone.

If Burr had said that in front of the others–his father and John knew that he knew. They knew and they hadn’t said a word to him about it. That almost hurt more than the fact Burr had figured them out.

They thought he couldn’t handle it. They thought he was too weak.

“Keep that to yourself, if you would,” Alex uttered and ripped his gaze away from the other man, stared back down into his lap like he had done before he came in.

“Of course. That’s not all, though.” No, it wouldn’t be. “About you being the general’s son-”

“Not true,” Alex cut in and heard Burr sigh, but he refused to meet his eyes again.

“Alexander, please-”

“No. It’s not true, Burr. My father’s name is James Hamilton, and I haven’t seen the bastard since I was six. General Washington is a concerned friend, and nothing more.” His voice was steady, but it held a weird note of bitterness. Burr had to have noticed, and Alexander realised too late that he had sounded frustrated, defensive. He hated only having half a working brain.

Burr crossed his arms in front of himself and arched an eyebrow, regarded him with a challenging look. “So Laurens keeps saying, too. Which is exactly why I don’t believe that for a second. That man would kill and die for you, I don’t think lying is where he would draw the line.”

Alex took a deep breath, swallowed the frustration and stamped out the glowing embers of anger inside his chest, schooled his features into something neutral, he hoped, as his hands began to noticeably shake around the book.

“The general-” he tried again, but Burr wouldn’t even hear it.

“Your father,” he corrected. “You don’t need to worry about me, Alexander, I won’t tell. I’m not here to taunt you. I just- those are secrets that could ruin you if they came out to the wrong person. Guard them more carefully.”

“You can’t know for sure,” Alex said and looked back up at him, took in the sure set of his shoulders and his calm demeanor, the half-smile on his lips- was that pity? It had to be. Alex was pathetic and Burr knew it, like he knew all his other secrets.

“But I do, Alexander,” he responded, not unkindly. He nodded at him and turned to leave, but glanced back at him over his shoulder, one foot already out the tent. “It’s the eyes,” he said, and was gone.

His world screeched to a halt as those words slammed into him again.

 _You have his eyes._ Alex made an odd sound in the back of his throat, something like a whimper, and hung his head, made himself smaller, less of a target.

His trembling hands came up and tangled in his hair, pulled, yanked, and that- were that his hands? Or were they someone else’s? No, they were his. He was alone. Alone, all alone, like he had been-

Every breath he took came quicker than the last one, but his lungs were still empty, straining, and he couldn’t get enough air, he couldn’t breathe, his chest hurt, his scalp stung- was he alone? He should be, but someone was screaming- was that him? He needed to be quiet.

The hands gripped tighter, pulled harder, and it hurt, and were those really his hands? He wasn’t sure anymore- There was a flash of blue. His skin felt too tight, his lungs shriveled up inside his chest, his heart would shatter his ribcage from the inside, there were _hands in his hair-_

There was someone behind him.

Alex wanted to beg, but he didn’t have enough air, he wanted to call out, to John, to Pa, but he couldn’t, the breath stuck in his throat and his lungs burned with the need for it.

He was so scared.

The afterimage of hands ghosted along his arms, his neck, his face, and he felt tainted, he felt ruined, he felt _dirty,_ he was-

He was _pathetic._

Alex sobbed, the only thing he was aware of the hands on his body, his own heaving wails, and the soft _tap tap tap_ of his tears on the leather of the book in his lap.


	13. Day Six (Part Two)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On today's episode: Washington is a dad (who is not convinced his son's boyfriend possesses any mental capacities) and John deals with emotional situations by cracking stupid jokes until the sad person laughs at something (a Mood)

John hurried out of headquarters without a second thought–he forgot to tell the general he was leaving and didn’t even think to answer Burr. Burr, who had just suggested he go check up on Alex, because he had ‘seemed off’ to him.

He walked briskly down rows of tents until he came to their own and strode in, only to stop dead in his tracks when he caught the first glimpse of Alex.

Guilt slammed into him, made his chest tight and his heart crack, rooted him to the ground where he stood just a few steps past the tent-flaps.

It seemed Alex hadn’t even noticed him enter over the sound of his own crying–his chest rose and fell too rapidly, he wasn’t breathing right, and he was in absolute hysterics.

They shouldn’t have left him alone. It had been too soon, John had _known_ he was struggling, why did he ever agree to part from him?

“Darling,” he said, low and soft, and came closer.

Alex shrunk further into himself, the fingers curled into his own hair tightening, closed around ruffled strands and tugged sharply. He watched as Alex’s shoulders shook with his sobs, and swallowed, his throat constricting and eyes wet with the onset of his own tears.

John suddenly wished Washington was there with them. He would have an easier time consoling Alex, he would know what to do.

The only thing John could think of was dropping to his knees in front of Alex and talking. He wouldn’t touch him, he didn’t think that was a good idea, but he doubted his voice would be enough to snap him out of it.

“Alexander. Darling. It’s all right. You’re safe, I’m here, there’s nothing to be afraid of.”

Alex wailed and tore at his hair, and John wanted to work his hands off, wanted to take them into his own and kiss his knuckles and run his own hand through those curls to fix them, but he held himself back.

“Alex, can you hear me? You have to breathe, darling,” he said. Desperation clawed cold into his chest, at his throat, and made his voice rough with unshed tears. Alex couldn’t hear him, and John didn’t know what to _do._ His racing thoughts circled back to Washington, but to fetch him would mean leaving Alex, and every cell in his body screamed with refusal at the mere thought.

Alex shook and whimpered. Perhaps he had to wait for this to pass–he couldn’t touch him, Alex didn’t hear a word he said, there really wasn’t anything he could do to calm him.

The sound of rustling canvas reached his ears and John snapped his head around, a glare firmly in place, ready to jump up from the ground and haul whoever it was back out by the lapels of their coat-

He stared straight at his commander, who froze for a second, looked from John to Alex and back, and hurried into the tent with purpose in his stride.

“Sir, how did you-” he began, meaning to ask how Washington had known to follow, but the man barely even glanced at him as he grabbed the blanket from John’s cot and made his way to Alex.

“You were gone without a word, I assumed something had come up with Alex,” he explained and shook out the blanket as he stepped around John, still on the ground, and gently draped it over his son’s quaking shoulders. He tugged it tight, careful not to touch him, and John drew in a deep breath and got back to his feet.

“What can I do?” he said, feeling lost and in the way all at once as he watched Washington do whatever it was he was doing with sure hands, like he had done it a million times before.

“Go sit over there and don’t make noise,” he replied and gestured vaguely over at John’s cot. His eyes never left his son; his son, whose heart-wrenching sobs were tearing away every bit of self-control John possessed. He wanted to argue, but he clicked his mouth shut when Alex hiccuped a wet cry and his fingers went limp in his hair.

“There we go,” Washington said in a soft, inviting tone.

John sat on his cot and shut up.

The general sat down next to Alex, far enough away another person could fit in between them with ease. 

“Count with me, Alexander,” he said, voice a gentle murmur, calm but firm.

He began to count up to ten slowly, then from ten back to one. John watched in bewilderment for three repeats, and then Alex took a shuddering breath and joined in on _four._

Washington’s lips quirked into a small smile, but it was tense. They did two more repeats; Alex gradually calmed and his breathing evened out again, and John thought he understood as he watched Alexander find back to himself–the counting was to get him to concentrate on something, something that wasn’t his panic.

John sighed in relief as Alex’s tears dried up completely and they stopped counting. The tent lay in silence for a while. It felt odd to him, heavy and large and stifling, like the blanket around Alexander's shoulders.

Alex sniffled and grabbed the corners of the blanket, drew it closer around his body as though to protect himself, like he used it as a shield, and stared down into his lap.

“Sorry. I don’t know what happened,” he said.

"Don't apologise, love. You don't have to explain yourself," Washington answered. He kept his distance, and he seemed to know what he was doing, so John followed his lead; no matter how much he wanted to go over there and hold Alex.

John bit the inside of his cheek and focused all his willpower on the task of staying silent. Alexander’s face glistened with tears, his hair was a mess and his breath still hitched from time to time, and the person who had last seen him before that episode was Aaron Burr. What the fuck had the idiot said to him? How hard did John have to clock him in the jaw?

“You should return to the others, Pa. We have a war to win,” Alex said with a smile so fake it might as well have been drawn on.

The general frowned. He had been reluctant to leave Alex in the first place–the only reason they had at all was the ever grinding rumour-mill that produced more and more gossip with every day that passed, and they had to at least attempt to do _some_ damage control–and after _this,_ after seeing how hard and painful the struggle was for Alex, John couldn’t imagine Washington would be happy to leave his son alone again for any stretch of time.

Washington sighed and closed his eyes in resignation, forced his lips to form a thin smile and slapped a hand to the cot once before he got up.

“You’re right, my heart. I’ll go–John stays.”

“We’ll be fine,” Alex said, but it sounded more like he was trying to convince himself rather than his father. Washington really was the strongest man John knew, considering that he could look back at Alexander like that, all soft, hurt smiles, mussed up hair, with upset obvious in his expressive eyes, and walk away. John wouldn’t be able to.

“Of course,” he said, playing along, and not for the first time it hit John what a good father he was. “Can I touch you, dearheart?”

Alex hesitated, opened his mouth, closed it, nodded.

“Use your words, please, Alexander.”

“Yes,” he said. “Sorry.”

The general smiled, less sad, softer than before, and put a hand to the side of Alex’s face, stroked his thumb along his cheek. Alex’s shoulders lost some of their tension, and he covered his father’s hand with his own, held it there as Washington bent down and kissed his forehead.

“I’ll come by tonight,” Washington promised and gently pulled his hand from his son’s grasp, even though his brow pinched like it pained him to let go, to leave him. 

He glanced over at John, weary. “Do try to refrain from doing something extraordinarily stupid.”

“Yessir,” he said and mock-saluted where he sat, and it had the desired effect of making Alex chuckle. The general just sighed and flapped a hand at him as he turned to leave, muttering something about ‘that one, he says’ under his breath.

He left, and it was just them again.

John sobered instantly. He got up and crossed the tent to the cot Alex occupied, sat down a good distance away from him like Washington had. Alex watched him, tired but not on edge, not afraid–something in John’s chest loosened. He couldn’t bear to imagine Alex looking at him like he was afraid he would harm him, like he was nervous to be around him for none of the good reasons and all of the bad ones.

“You could have told me Burr knows about us,” he said and turned his head away, cast his gaze down to the ground, to his lap, to his slightly unsteady hands.

Was that what had set this off? Burr and his newfound enjoyment of sticking his fucking nose where it didn’t belong?

“Is that what this was about? I’ll _kill_ him-”

“It wasn’t. It was something else. Not his fault. I just assumed the man who I want to share my life with would tell me something like that.” He raised his eyes back to John’s face and stared, hard and without any visible emotion. John opened his mouth, but Alex went on before he could get a word out. “I thought we were being honest with each other. You should have told me.”

John swallowed, the faint tug of guilt on his conscience like a constant ache that flared up from time to time, and reached a hand over the suddenly too vast space separating them. He moved slowly, giving Alex ample time to track his progress, and watched his face for any sign of discomfort.

His hand hovered over Alex’s lap, where his hands rested. 

“May I?” he asked, and Alex turned his left hand palm up–an invitation.

John smiled, not as bright as he usually would at the prospect of getting to hold Alex’s hand, and twined their fingers together; snug, warm, familiar. A perfect fit.

He scooted closer, close enough their arms almost touched, but not quite. “I’m sorry, Alex. The truth is, well, it just slipped my mind. I was too caught up in the whole situation to really think about any of that, and then I was too caught up in having you back, and- I guess I was just preoccupied. I didn’t keep this from you with malicious intent, I swear, darling,” he said, looking Alex straight in the eyes as he did. He had beautiful eyes, even if it wasn’t quite the right time to contemplate how pretty they were.

Alex searched his face and stayed silent for another minute, blinked and turned his attention down to their joined hands resting on his thigh instead.

“That’s fair, I guess.”

“Am I forgiven, then?” John inquired carefully, ducked down a little to shove himself back into Alex’s line of sight and smiled up at him when he side-eyed him with a pinch in his upper lip that meant he was trying to force down a smile of his own.

“Yes, you’re forgiven, you fool,” he said and nudged him rather aggressively with his shoulder as the smile finally won over his self-control and broke out onto his features. God, he was so beautiful. John loved him so much.

Which was why he calmed the enamoured flutter of his heart and forced himself to be serious once more.

“Can I ask what exactly it was that caused this episode?” he said, quiet, soft, understanding. He didn’t want to startle him with the question.

Alex froze and his grip on John’s hand tightened for a moment before it relaxed again. 

“I don’t- really want to talk about it. Something Burr said reminded me of something Smith said. He couldn’t have known, it wasn’t his fault.”

John squeezed his hand and pressed a quick kiss to Alex’s temple. Despite his repeated insistence that Burr wasn’t at fault, John made a mental note to punch the man in the nose the next time he saw him, just for good measure. 

“It’s fine if you don’t want to talk about it. I just- can you perhaps give me some pointers?”

Alex looked back at him in confusion, his eyebrows raised the fraction of an inch and the corner of his mouth turned down–hints of an expression he could decipher without issue, but were hard to pick up on for people who didn’t know him well.

John smiled and tugged the blanket back into place where it threatened to slip off Alex’s shoulder. “If there’s anything in particular that would set you off, I mean. That… was scary, darling. You couldn’t even hear me, could you? I don’t want to cause one of those on accident.”

Alex blinked, and his eyes flashed with realisation, then dimmed back down. “You spoke to me?” he asked, voice small.

“That’s what I mean. You were far gone, Alex. It scared me.” He snaked an arm around Alex’s shoulders and pulled him to his chest, careful and without pressure–he could break free any time he wanted. He chose not to, and laid his head on John’s shoulder.

“I don’t want to get into it. One thing, though,” he said and paused to kiss John’s neck.

“Yes?”

Alex swallowed. The hand in his trembled, and Alex held onto him tighter to still it. “If you ever call me ‘sweetheart’ again I might kick you in the dick reflexively.”

John bit back the surprised bark of laughter that bubbled up his throat, but then he realised what Alex had just told him. _What_ had the bastard called him? How often had he called him that? How had he said it? What _else_ had he done to Alex?

“No problem at all,” he said, his eyes suddenly wet, but he didn’t think Alex could hear it in his voice. “I like ‘darling’ better anyways.”

Alex chuckled; something sounded off about it. John wouldn’t pry him away to see if he had started crying again. “Me too.”

They sat like that, just enjoying each other, the company, the warmth, for a while. John finally gave in to the urge to smooth Alexander’s hair down and cradled the base of his skull in his hand when he was done with that.

“Could I do that thing with the counting if this were to happen again?” he said, gently rocking them back and forth. Alex lay relaxed against his side; he had to be exhausted after that kind of exertion.

“Hm,” Alex hummed. “Yes. Gives me something to focus on. Patterns are good.”

“All right, darling.” He shuffled a bit, kissed the top of Alex’s head. “You can count on me.”

Alex groaned. The mood shifted with it, and just like that, John wasn’t afraid Alex would tear apart at the seams from the pressure inside him; for the moment, at least. “Fuck you.”

“You love me,” John said, chuckling.

He groaned again, louder. “God help me, I do. I really do.”

“And I love you, my dearest. Even though you can’t appreciate my brilliant jokes.”

“I will hit you, Laurens,” he grumbled against his neck.

“Careful, you’re beginning to sound just like your father,” he shot back, grinning from ear to ear. Banter with Alex was so easy, so warm and comfortable.

Alex groaned a third time. “Fuck you!”

“I mean, if you insist, darling-"

“If you even conceptualise finishing that sentence, I’m leaving you,” he cut in, and John felt the graze of teeth on his neck, followed by a light nip.

“Sorry,” he said, smiling to himself like a fool in love. “You know I’m not being serious.”

The weight of Alex’s head lifted from his shoulder, and he watched as Alex sorted himself out and shifted back into a proper sitting position. He didn’t move away, John was pleased to note. The fact Alex seemed to still feel safe around him, that he didn’t mind John’s touch and wanted to be near him, set his heart ablaze with affection, woke a protectiveness in him that almost suffocated him with how hefty and urgent it felt.

John leaned forward ever so slightly, tilted his head, and stopped short of pressing his lips to Alexander’s. He caught his meaning and met him in the middle, and they shared more than a few kisses, soft and tender, without urgency or need.

Alex was the one to pull back. John gazed into his dark eyes, his eyes that held all the marks of heartbreak and fatigue, and considered how lucky they were to have found each other in a world as wide as the one they lived in.

He laid his forehead against Alex’s, nuzzled their noses together, and Alex let out a giggle, a brief sound of delight that went straight to John’s heart; his heart that was so full of Alexander that he felt it might flow over.

“What would you say to a nap, darling?”

Alex hummed–no, it was more like a purr. The purr of a very content tomcat. “That’s the best idea you’ve had all week.”

He rolled his eyes, but his smile didn’t fade. “Now you’re really starting to sound like your father.”

“Oh, shut up,” Alex said and pulled him down to the cot with him.


	14. Day Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry, but Alex still doesn't have a good time in this chapter, wtf
> 
> Anyways! We are hurdling towards the end of this - there will be one more chapter, probably, but don't hold me on that. Do y'all remember when I said at the beginning that I had this half written? So that was a fucking lie, I had like 5000 when I said that. This wasn't supposed to be long! I had like two plot-points and three scenes I really wanted to write that would have been incomprehensible on their own, and this happened.
> 
> See you in the next one, I guess! Thanks for sticking with me so far :)

Alex lay curled up on his side on his father’s cot and watched him work at his desk, the parchment he signed coloured yellow in the warm light of both a candle and an oil-lamp.

The scene took him back to years ago, when Alex had been a boy; he had liked to join his father in his study as he worked, and read. They hadn’t talked a lot, but the silence had been comfortable, and if Alex was being honest with himself, which he hadn’t been because he had been ten, he had really gone in there for the company. He hadn’t liked the thought of being alone as a child. He still didn’t.

“Do you think I look like you?” Alex said, just as his father put his quill down and corked the inkwell.

He turned to face him, a thoughtful expression in his eyes, and Alex knew it wasn’t because he contemplated the answer to his question–he wondered about why he had asked it in the first place.

“No,” he said after a short pause, unbothered. Too unbothered. He suspected where this was going. “I think you look like your mother. And my brother, for some reason.”

Alex chuckled a little at that and shifted, rested his head on his folded arm. “Your brother?”

He nodded. “My brother. Lawrence. I have my moments when I look at you and can’t help but think of him. He would have loved you–but let’s not change the subject. What brought this on, dearheart?”

Straight to the chase, as only his father could. Alex sighed and let his gaze drift along the canvas of the tent, painted a soft gold.

“Burr is infuriatingly certain that I’m your son,” he said, sending a silent prayer off into the void that his father wouldn’t connect that fact with the little incident from the day before.

He prayed for naught. “Is that the reason your idiot punched him this morning? Really, Alex, as much as I want to tolerate Laurens and whatever the hell he thinks he’s doing, I should have thrown him out of the army after his little disappearing act. I didn’t even demote him, and now he’s going around punching his colleagues! Control your…” he paused, searching for the right word. “John, if you would.”

Alex heaved a sigh, but it settled into a fond smile. John had returned to him that morning after an absence of perhaps ten minutes, a self-satisfied grin on his face and the knuckles of one hand bloodied, and had informed him that ‘Burr got what he had coming’. Alex had scolded him, of course, but he’d also kissed John’s knuckles better when he had asked him to and then proceeded to take a nap on top of him, so that lecture probably hadn't made it through.

“I told him off, don’t worry, Pa,” he said.

“People are going to start accusing me of favouritism! Because of _Laurens_!” he went on. Alex knew he was genuinely upset about any accusations of favouritism or nepotism, but he could also recognise that right now, he put on a silly little act for Alex’s sake. Well, it absolutely worked, because Alex had to turn his head to stifle a snicker into his bent elbow.

“Laurens has never been my favourite in anything,” he huffed and turned his chair to face him. Alex swallowed the urge to make a quip about his old back not being able to take twisting around like that anymore. “While we’re on the topic of that golden-hearted fool: wouldn’t you rather spend the evening with him, love? Not that I’m trying to get rid of you, but I wouldn’t want John to feel neglected.”

“It’s sweet of you to pretend to care about John’s feelings,” Alex said. The sudden warmth in his chest almost brought tears to his eyes–his father was trying so hard to accept them, to understand them, and he did it all for him. 

“But he’ll live. I-” His chest wasn’t the only warm part of him as he forced himself to return his father’s gaze, even as the blood rushed to his cheeks. “I wanted to spend time with you. I missed you a lot when I was- gone.”

The look on his father’s face could only be described as _heartbreak,_ and Alex cursed himself for reminding him of it, of the whole ordeal, because he was just like his son in that respect – he dwelled on things. Too long, sometimes, and he couldn’t have many moments where _that_ thing wasn’t on his mind. And Alex went and forced it back upon him.

“My sweet boy,” he muttered, soft, like it wasn’t necessarily intended for Alex’s ears. He rose from his chair and sat down next to him on the cot instead, so Alex raised himself up into a sitting position to make space. A wince slipped past his carefully sealed lips when there was a sharp stab of pain just underneath one of his shoulder-blades, and his father’s frown deepened.

Alex watched as he took a deep breath and seemed to prepare himself for something, and his stomach sank. This was the Conversation. The one his father always insisted on having after something bad happened. He hadn’t skipped it this time, he had just put it off until he thought Alex well enough to have it.

“Look, Alexander. I know this is very hard for you, as it is for me, as it is for John,” he began, his voice so gentled it didn’t even really sound like him anymore. “This was a horrible thing to go through, and I can’t tell you how relieved I am to have you back, and without lasting damage on top of that.”

Alex just nodded and cleared his throat, but the lump didn’t disappear. Tears already pricked at his eyes, and he looked away from his father, from the painfully honest expression on his face, and stared at the sheets between them.

“Please look at me, Alexander.” Of course he wouldn’t let him get away that easy.

He looked back up and met his father’s eyes once more.

“We know about the nightmares, dearheart. There are things you’re not telling us–and that’s fine. You are not obligated to share this with either of us, but-” He reached up and cupped Alex’s jaw, put his thumb just underneath his lower lip and tugged it free of his teeth–he hadn’t even noticed he had taken it between them. “I can tell just how much it’s eating away at you, my love. I want you to remember that you don’t have to do any of this on your own, all right?”

Alex nodded. He averted his gaze again as his sight became blurry with tears, and why did he have to _cry_ all the time, anyway? He was sick of it, sick of the useless blubbering that did nothing but hurt John and Pa further, that forced them to deal with his problems for him.

His body didn’t care, as usual, and the tears spilled with his next blink; he did choke down the accompanying sob. He had done enough of that yesterday.

“I- I hated him so much,” he said as his father stroked the tears off his cheeks before they could drip down his chin. A stupid thing to say–it was quite obvious he would hate the man who had taken him prisoner, who had tortured and belittled him.

“He touched me a lot.” From one moment to the other, his father’s face was thunderous, the fury burning bright in his dark eyes, and Alex realised his mistake. “Not like that! Just… my hair. Arms. Face. That’s what the nightmares are about. That, and the things he said.”

The expression on his father’s face still didn’t settle back into the soft, open one he had started off with, the upset obvious in his furrowed brows and the way one corner of his mouth twisted off to the side.

Alex liked it better that way. It reminded him that he wasn’t the only fool with emotions.

“I can’t seem to get rid of him,” he said, but his voice cracked on the last word, and his breath hitched, and he knew he had lost that battle. He ducked his head, let his hair fall forward around his face, like a curtain, and sobbed.

“Oh, Alex…” his father said, but Alex couldn’t look back up, not even as careful hands stroked his hair back and came to rest on the sides of his head. “Give it time, my heart. It has only been a few days. Your mind needs time to recover, just as your body does. It will get better, you’ll see.”

Alex grabbed for his father’s wrists and held on, desperate to ground himself in the moment, to not slip away again like he had the day before. Like that, he had to look directly at his bandaged arms, and he screwed his eyes shut.

“But what if it doesn’t?” he pressed out and paused, forced himself to take a few deep breaths, but they did nothing to calm his cries, slow his tears. “I- I’ll always be reminded of him, Pa. He’ll always be _there,_ I’ll look down and see his marks. He carved himself into my skin, and I won’t ever be able to forget.”

He hadn’t even finished speaking before his father pulled him close to his chest, one arm around his shoulders, a comforting weight that Alex had associated with protection and safety since he was a boy, his other hand carding through his hair.

He buried his face against his father’s strong shoulder as he tried to shush him, but Alex wasn’t done, he needed to spit the thoughts out before they poisoned him.

“The scars will be there for everyone to see, and you will have to look at them, John will have to look at them, and- and Ma and Jacky will see them and ask about them, and then I’ll have to _tell them,_ and-” he drew in a shaky breath and let it out too quick, dug his fingers into his father’s wrist, even though he knew it had to hurt him. “They’re just so _ugly,_ Papa. I feel _ruined._ ”

“Alexander, stop,” he said, and he sounded choked up, like he had started crying–of course, Alex thought, a bitter taste on his tongue, because the only thing he ever did was hurt people.

“You are not ruined, dearheart. You are not ugly.” He pried him away gently, careful like he was made of glass–which was fair, because that was what Alex felt like. Fragile, thin, transparent.

His father slipped his hand from his hair, down to his chin, and tilted his head up so he could look him in the eyes. Alex fought the urge to avert his gaze. He knew he was a mess, and Pa was far more patient with him than he deserved. His father had acquired many scars in twenty years of service, and there his pathetic, selfish son was, bawling like a child about the few he had.

“Do you want to know what John and I will think every time we see those marks, Alex?” he said and didn’t pause to let him answer, which was the smart thing to do, because Alex would have shook his head. “We will think _Thank God he’s alive._ _Thank God he’s here._ You survived, Alex. You came out of that, and we’re so proud of you.”

Alex swallowed, attempted to get his breathing under control, and sniffled. He felt disgusting. His father didn’t think so, apparently, because he leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his forehead, to both of his tear-stained cheeks, and Alex couldn't help the vague sound of amusement he made at that.

“I’m proud of you,” he repeated. “You were so brave and strong, and you got yourself out of there. That’s amazing, my love. You are amazing.”

Alex shook his head and looked away. He was pathetic. It was over and done with, and yet Alex couldn’t pick up the pieces and go on, couldn’t just move past it.

“Hey,” his father said and gave his chin a little tap to draw his attention again. “Have I ever lied to you?”

He chuckled weakly. Well, tried to chuckle. Made a sound that might have been one on a better day. “No.”

“So, when I tell you that it might never fully stop hurting, but it will hurt less and less over time, when I promise you that you are strong enough to make it through this–what’s that?”

“The truth,” he answered.

“Exactly.” He drew him close again, kissed the top of his head, and just held Alex for a while. Feeling his father’s chest rise against his own and thinking about John who waited for him in their tent, alive and unharmed, Alex thought that the whole thing had been worth it; even if it had torn a wound that would never fully heal.

* * *

When Alex came back from the general’s tent that night, two things were very clear to John: One, he had been crying–fair, all things considered, but the realisation still punched a hole into his chest. Two, he was on a mission.

That mission being getting into John’s pants. John did not know how to feel about that. They hadn’t- not in a while. Not since. And Alex had been _crying,_ for God’s sake. He could still taste the salt on his lips.

Alex shifted on his lap, ground down, and John hissed as his hands flew up to his hips and stilled them.

“Darling-” he mumbled against his lips, and the arms wrapped around his shoulders squeezed.

“Please, just- I need you,” Alex interrupted, kissed a trail from the corner of John’s mouth down along his jaw. And fuck, had he missed this, his scent, his weight, his warmth, his lips, just _Alex,_ but… but Alex had been crying.

“What happened, Alex? We won’t do anything before you tell me what made you so upset.”

He paused at the crook of John’s neck. “I’m not upset.”

John sighed and rubbed his open palms over the hip-bones in his grasp in what he hoped was a soothing motion.

“What was that about being honest with each other?”

The arms slipped off his shoulders, and Alex sat back on John’s thighs. He worried his lip between his teeth and stared back at him with unsure eyes, still a little red-rimmed, and it tore at John how insecure he looked. Alex wasn’t supposed to look insecure; he was always so sure of himself, of his abilities, and for good reason.

“If you don’t want to, I’ll stop,” he said instead of telling him what it was that bothered him, which was typical, really.

“Alex,” he said, but it sounded like a sigh, and slipped his thumbs underneath the fabric of Alex’s shirt, drew soft circles onto warm skin. “It’s not that I don’t want to… in general. I do. But I can tell that you were crying not too long ago, darling, and this would be the first time since-” he cut himself off there, not sure what to say, how to say it. “Just tell me what’s wrong, please?”

Alex deflated, shrunk into himself, and avoided his eyes. He had a knack for making himself look small, John thought, even though he wasn’t actually as physically small as some might think just from looking at him sometimes. He wondered why that was, and decided to delve into _that_ issue some other night.

He stayed silent for a long time, but John was a patient man–well, he could be a patient man, if something was worth the wait. Alexander always was.

“Do you- I mean-” he began suddenly and shattered the tense silence that had fallen over them. He still wouldn’t meet his eye, John noted, his stomach laying itself into knots with worry.

“Do you still want me?” Alex blurted out, stock still on top of John, staring off into the shadow cast by the cot they sat on.

John blinked. Did he still _want_ him? “Could you… elaborate?”

Alex fell into another silence, and his face grew redder by the second. “Do you still want me… like this?”

By ‘like this’, John assumed he meant, well, being intimate with each other, but that did nothing to lift his confusion. Why wouldn’t he want him? He was still the man he loved, the absolutely stunning-and-he-knew-it, brilliant man he fell for.

“Of course I do, darling. Why wouldn’t I?” he said, shot him a playful grin and pecked his nose, just to hear him let out an annoyed breath.

Alex stroked his hands up and down John’s chest, absentminded, like he wasn’t even aware he was doing it, and continued to stare just past John.

“Even with the scars?” he asked quietly, his voice delicate, thin even, as though he was afraid of the answer.

The breath stuck in John’s throat. So that was what this was about.

If Alex hadn’t stabbed the asshole John would have left right then to do it himself.

“Alex, darling,” he said, softly, and withdrew his hands from his hips, brought them up to cup his face instead, and turned his head the slightest bit, so John would be in his direct line of sight. “You will always be beautiful to me.”

He pressed a gentle kiss to those clever lips. “Gorgeous.” Another. “Just lovely.”

John pulled back a little and looked Alex in the eyes–they brimmed with such vulnerability, such open affection and doubt and something so tender and breakable, John just wanted to hold him tight and make him forget about it all.

“Show me?” Alex said, almost shy.

John smiled, nothing like the grin from before, soft and private, something that was for Alex only.

“Anything you want, darling,” he muttered against his lips and drew him close again, but he wouldn't let go this time.


	15. Day Thirty-five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this took a while! Sorry about that, I got distracted and wrote the wholeass prequel to the series before finishing this, but that was very on brand for me, lol.
> 
> Once again, thank you for reading this whole thing! I had a lot of fun writing it :)

John shifted on their cot and drew the blankets tighter around himself. He was… cold. He had a vague sense he shouldn’t be.

His arm flung out to his side in search of the warm body that should be next to him, but only found cool sheets–Alex was gone. John cracked his eyes open and sat up, looked around, but the tent was dark and he was alone.

He sighed and kicked the blanket off, slid his boots on and stepped outside.

There were two places Alex could be. If he was with the general, John would let them be and go back to sleep, but if his hunch was correct, well. He would have to see.

He went by headquarters first, because it did not seem a far stretch that Alex would be just _that_ ridiculous. 

And it wasn’t. A single candle burned inside the tent, and the man he loved sat at his hitherto abandoned desk, papers stacked like towers around him. That desk had been an odd negative space for the past few weeks, and he knew he hadn't been the only one to feel that way. Something had been missing, and the empty desk had acted as a symbol for it.

John took a moment to admire Alex's profile painted in the soft, warm light of a flickering flame and gave himself a mental shake in order to get a grip.

"What do you think you're doing, Alex?" he said, and Alex jumped in his seat and snapped his head around, one of his hands that had rested upon the table snatching up a letter-opener, and John raised his hands in front of himself. 

What the fuck was wrong with him? If there was one person around he shouldn't sneak up on under any circumstances, it would be Alex.

"It's me, darling," he said softly. Alex's shoulders relaxed and his fingers slackened until the letter-opener dropped to the tabletop with a quiet clatter.

"Sorry. I'm sorry, I didn't mean- you startled me, is all," he said and turned back to the desk, straightened his papers out.

"I know. It was my fault." He made his way over to where Alex sat, careful to put more weight into his steps so he could still tell where he was even without seeing him. "But forget about that. What _is it_ you think you're doing?"

John arrived behind him and settled his hands on his shoulders, stroked and kneaded the tense muscles until they gave and melted under his palms.

Alex shuddered and breathed deeply once, twice, then leaned back into his touch. John smiled to himself–they had made a lot of progress these last few weeks, most of it because Alex, strong and brave and wonderful as he was, had opened up to him about what exactly he had had to endure during his captivity.

He knew the position they were in would trigger unpleasant memories, but Alex insisted he didn't want to be treated like he was made of sugar, and that as long as he didn't speak up, it was all right.

"Pa said I could go back to work today," Alex said and pulled what John recognised to be Tilghman's draft for a letter to one of the other Generals from a stack. Poor guy, he thought, Alex was vicious with his corrections.

"It's the middle of the night, darling."

"It's after midnight," he replied, and John chuckled and bent down, slipped his arms over Alex's shoulders and wound them loosely around his chest. He didn't pull him back against him like he wanted to do, for obvious reasons.

"I think what he meant when he said that was more along the lines of _in the morning,_ you know, when everyone else starts work?"

Alex hummed–John could hear the grin in it–and uncorked an inkpot.

“He should have said that, then,” he said, but the amusement drained from his voice as he went on. “I’ve been idle for way too long. You know I get stir-crazy. Besides, I need to work myself back in, I need to know where we stand and what’s happening where.”

John sighed and watched Alex’s nimble fingers fiddle with a fresh quill. He knew that was just how he was; he always needed to do something, to work, to move forward in any capacity at all, even if he had to crawl when he’d rather _charge._

It was almost a miracle that the general and John had managed to keep him away for as long as they had; or perhaps it was an indication of how badly what happened had really affected Alex.

“So, that’s how it’s going to be again? Early mornings and long nights?” he asked, low and gentle and not a hint reproachful. That was what Alex needed, what he was, and he wouldn’t scold him for it. He wanted Alexander, all of him, and that was just part of the deal.

Alex nodded and tilted his head back against John’s shoulder, fingers stilling. John found the moment almost too ideal, and he worked to commit it to memory. 

Everything felt so soft and comfortable, all the sharp edges of reality dulled by the soft, ever-changing flame of the candle, and it was just the two of them in a place usually crammed with people, with action and energy; it felt like the world had fallen away, and it was just them. Just John holding Alex and pretending to try to entice him back to bed with him, knowing full well nothing he could do except for picking him up and carrying him would move him to do so. 

An image flashed before his mind’s eye–them, like they were now, in five years time. Ten years time. He shook himself.

“The early mornings are a given, but… maybe the nights won’t be quite as long as they used to be. I doubt Pa would let me get away with it.”

John smiled, small and soft, so unlike his usual ear-to-ear smile. Those kinds of expressions were made by Alex, for Alex.

He kissed the shell of his ear, his earlobe, the corner of his jaw, and Alexander tilted his head to the side to give him better access, humming a low note of pleasure.

“I liked getting to go to bed with you. Do you think that could be arranged?”

"How could I say no when you're asking this nicely?" he said and turned his head to face him so John could put a quick kiss to his lips.

"Anyway," he said and turned back to his papers suddenly, and John moved to press his lips to the juncture of Alex's neck and shoulder instead. "I've got work to do. Stop distracting me."

"Cold," John muttered, hiding a grin against Alex’s neck. "You talk to the love of your life like that? After you snuck out and left me all by my poor self in the middle of the night like some cheap-"

"All right,” Alex cut in. “I get the picture. I'm sorry, love. But I _do_ have work, and I didn't mean to wake you, so: go back to bed, John."

As if he would just go back to sleep and let Alexander sit there in the dark on his own.

He straightened back up with a final squeeze to Alex's shoulders and went over to his own desk, scooped up some of his yet to be finished work, and grabbed hold of a random chair on his way back.

Alex watched with a halfhearted frown as he set the chair down next to him and plopped down on it, moved some of Alex's stacks around to make space.

"You have your own desk, you know," he said, watching him shuffle his papers and probably ruin his organisation.

"I'm aware," he said and reached out to brush a strand of hair behind Alex's ear. "but the view over here is so much prettier."

Alex blinked at him, and a faint blush crept up high into his cheekbones–it should be illegal to look like that. John could look at him as he was right that moment forever, unguarded, safe, flushed with pleasure, and bathed in the warm glow of a lone candle.

Alex swallowed hard and ripped his gaze away, stared down at his parchment instead, and the dim light drew long shadows of his eyelashes over his cheeks.

"You're a sap," he said, fighting a small smile. John nudged his leg under the table and scooted a bit closer. 

"Your sap."

Alex looked back up and met his eye. "My sap," he agreed.

John couldn't take any more of this. He cupped Alex's cheek with one hand, tilted his head a little, and captured those lips in a kiss.

Alex reciprocated with enthusiasm and opened his mouth for him, and John slipped his tongue against his, velvet-smooth and hot and just right.

Fingers curled into the collar of his nightshirt and yanked him closer; his fingertips sparked against Alex's skin, his lips tingled, his blood rushed and sang with _Alex._

John couldn’t be sure how long they stayed like that, but it wasn’t long enough, in his opinion, before Alex broke the kiss and put their foreheads together, soft, heavy breaths puffing against John’s cheek.

“Is this your idea of not distracting me?” he asked, his voice rough in a way John was very familiar with, and he huffed out a quiet laugh in response.

“You kissed back, darling.”

Alex rolled his eyes and gave him a gentle shove to the chest, making him fall back into his own chair as Alex turned away and ran a hand through his hair–he always did that when he tried to make himself decent again, and it did absolutely nothing, but it _was_ adorable.

“I’m just saying,” John began anew and reached for a quill. “It takes two-”

“Oh, shut up and do your work,” Alex interrupted. He picked up the candle and moved it closer so both of them could see what they were doing, almost as if he had sensed John was about to complain that it was too dark to work.

John didn’t say anything to that for a short while and reread the first page of what he had written maybe twelve hours ago, before he looked back up and his eyes found Alexander again.

“One last thing,” he said and grinned at Alex when he snapped his eyes up from the parchment and half-glared at him in a way that reminded him uncomfortably of the general.

“What?”

“I love you.”

Alex rolled his eyes and huffed out an annoyed breath, turned his attention back to his pages. “I love you too, you dork.”

Well, not exactly his most heartfelt declaration of love, but John would take it.

* * *

Alex returned all the drafts he had borrowed for the night to where he had found them and put the one he had penned for a letter to congress down on his father’s desk so he could go over it.

Morning dawned slow and milky; he hated those kinds of mornings, when one couldn’t be sure if it was light out already or not. It inspired in him the profound desire to go back to bed until the new day had made up its mind.

John sat hunched over in the chair he had stolen from somewhere, face hidden in his folded arms on top of the desk, and snored softly.

Alex sat on the edge of the table next to him and ran his fingers through his unbound curls, stealing another short moment of intimacy with his sweet, ridiculous fool before everyone started showing up for the day.

He’d known John wouldn’t last the whole night. He rarely ever did, and John must have known that as well, but he had still stayed, had gotten some work done with him, and Alex could have burst with affection for that man.

“Oh, for God’s sake, are you kidding me?”

Alex whirled around and jumped a good two feet away from John.

His father stood just past the tent-flaps and watched him with an almost overwhelming sense of resignation, Tilghman just a step behind him and another voice Alex recognised as Harrison inquiring what on earth could be going on _now._

“Umm…” Alex made and crossed his arms over his chest, propped his hip against the edge of the table. “You said I could come back today.”

“You did say that, Sir,” Harrison said with a poorly controlled expression of mirth and came to a stop next to Tilghman. Alex had always liked Harrison–he was the oldest out of all of them, already past thirty, and he had a good sense of humour, but knew how to get them back on track when needed.

His father just closed his eyes and heaved a sigh that sounded too long-suffering for how early in the morning it was.

“Welcome back, Hamilton,” he said on his way past Alex to his own desk.

“Why is Laurens asleep on the table?” Tilghman asked and came to stand next to him, prodding his still form gently in the shoulder.

“And why did that not faze you, Sir?” Harrison added as he got settled at his desk.

“After all the headaches Laurens has caused me,” his father said, picking up a piece of parchment and glancing at Alex–the draft he had written, probably. “I honestly cannot spare the energy to care about this.”

“That’s fair,” Harrison said.

Tilghman shrugged and left for his desk, only to stop and frown down at it.

“I put some suggestions,” Alex explained, and Tilghman picked up his draft and shook his head, but he was smiling as he did.

“It really wasn't the same without you here, Hamilton,” he said, and Alex grinned back at him.

“Yes,” Harrison agreed. “So tranquil and peaceful… well, except for that one time Laurens punched Burr. But you are quite right, Tilghman, I for one am happy to return to the tyranny of our dear Hamilton.”

“Tyranny,” Alex repeated with a roll of his eyes. “What you call ‘tyranny’, I call ‘making friendly suggestions’.”

“I mean, so would the very monarch we are trying to rid ourselves of, probably,” Harrison shot back, and Tilghman snickered. His father gave him a look. Rude.

“If you want me to leave again-”

“Please don’t, Laurens has been insufferable the past week, and we hoped he would be cured of his moping once you got back,” Harrison said. All in good humour, Alex knew, but Tilghman still froze for a second. It was fine, he wanted to say. Jokes were fine. Don’t act suspicious.

“Well, rest assured, I’ll try my best to lift his spirits.”

The rest of the guys trickled in one after the other, and all of them expressed to him how glad they were to see him back; it was… nice. After over a month of only having his father, John, and Lafayette to talk to–and one memorable time, Burr–it was good to talk to other people again, to make inconsequential jokes and not feel like everyone treaded on eggshells around him, just waiting for him to break down and fall apart.

It restored some sense of normalcy for him, even though he found himself tugging on his shirtsleeves quite a lot, just to make sure they hadn’t ridden up.

John woke on his own after a while, because for some reason they had all unanimously decided to leave him be, and turned to face Alex’s father, eyes bleary with sleep, and just told him ‘I don’t have an explanation for this.’

His father, of course, responded with a shake of his head and ‘I hadn’t expected you to have one.’

The men, predictably, thought that exchange hilarious.

They teased John for the rest of the day without mercy, and Alex sat by and threw in a few comments when he thought appropriate, smiling to himself like an absolute idiot. He hadn’t realised how much he had missed all of them. The work, something to occupy him, yes. But _them,_ the banter and the comradery, it felt like something had clicked back into place.

No, not something. Alex had clicked into place. He was no longer drifting. 

He was back where he wanted to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also am on [Tumblr](http://binch-i-might-be.tumblr.com) if anyone wants to like, yell at me over there :)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


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